Hacking a firewall

["Simon Martin" <smartin@isys.cl>]

Hi all,

I have tendered for a few Internet/Intranet projects where I will be using
Debian with Apache / sendmail / inn / etc to provide the necessary services.
I have no problems with this, but I will also need to install a firewall,
typical configuration (MZ, DMZ, World). I would like to use Debian here as
well to keep everything on the same platform (do not read same host), but I
come up against a distinct lack of knowledge, from a sales as well as a
technical point of view:

1) Comparison of Debian Vs Firewall-1
My major competition here is Firewall-1. Anyone know of any comparison of
features / robustness / weaknesses?

2) VPN
Is this available on Debian? Can I get the TCP/IP stack to encrypt / decrypt
automatically? If so what encryption methods are available?

3) Hacking
I am no hacker, and I need to become one to test my installations. Anyone
know of resources (official or clandestine) that could help me in this
respect. This actually could become quite a little niche market as I am sure
that down here very few people really have the knowledge to test / debug
firewall performance.

I know that this last request is a very sensitive issue indeed. If any
further documentation is required to insure the legitimacy of my request
then please feel free to e-mail me.

    __ _   Debian GNU User
   / /(_)_ __  _   ___  __   Simon Martin
  / / | | '_ \| | | \ \/ /   Project Manager
 / /__| | | | | |_| |>  <    Isys
 \____/_|_| |_|\__,_/_/\_\   mailto: smartin@isys.cl