Tag: Command Line

I have run into a few times when I needed to turn off or on the Windows Firewall via command line or script. It is actually very simple to do!

To Turn Off:
NetSh Advfirewall set allprofiles state off

To Turn On:
NetSh Advfirewall set allrprofiles state on

To check the status of Windows Firewall:
Netsh Advfirewall show allprofiles

You can replace “allprofiles” with public, domain, or private and you can manipulate just that one profile. I used this in creating a script to test the firewall settings of a remote server. That way if I messed up the config, it would turn itself back off after a minute and I was able to reconnect to it. You can view that script on my other post Testing Windows Firewall Settings Safely From Remote Machine.

A while back I got me a new crisp Windows Server. By default, the Firewall was turned off and of course I wanted to turn it on for security reasons. But what happens if I lose my connection to a server a few hundred miles away? How would I disable the firewall if I can’t connect to it anymore? I decided to write a script!

The function of the script is to enable the firewall for the public internet, wait 2 minutes, then disable it again. Here is my script:

@echo off
Netsh Advfirewall set public state on
timeout 120
Netsh Advfirewall set public state off

Save those lines as a batch file, then run it as Administrator. Keep in mind to use this at your own risk! It saved me, but never know about you! An explanation of the commands can be found on my other post Turn Windows Firewall Off or On By Command Line Or Script.