Which ADSL router for strong security?

Ok, so for the last 3-4 months I've been getting increasing numbers of attacks, kicking my router into reboot, blocking my access out etc. Since I discovered and cleaned out the likely cause of this - another users PC infested with Malware (he seems to think security is only needed if HE uses his CC online) - the disconnects and dropouts, HEC errors et al have increased, to the extent that having an hour without disruption feels like the big annual holiday - I think the botmeister wants his zombie PC back!

So, ISP change is planned but I'm also looking at getting something that might hold the connection up longer in the event that I get hit hard again.

Any suggestions (apart from fratricide, I think that's still illegal over here)?

 

Block his internet access?

Joke^^

Seriously, consider an old PC with something like PFSense or SmoothWall running on it. That way you can restrict what he can put out and what comes in. If you can restrict what comes off of his PC (so he only has port 80 and 443 access, for instance (although this may be going too far)) then you can prevent any malware "phoning home" unless it uses a common port like 80 or 443.

 

Since his machine is now clean, the biggest problem is trying to rebuff the attacks on the router which block us from getting out, causes the router to reboot, etc. If we're lucky enough to get a new IP address on router reboot, I often get some respite for a few hours, maybe half a day. But a side effect of these forced reboots is that the BT exchange translates this as being an unstable line and it drops back into training mode and we end up being forced back into an IP address or range that's being scanned

I think that the reason they can now track us so easily is that we use an ASUS router, it's not so common and perhaps they can recognise us easily from some 'fingerprint' it supplies as a result of their scans?

Within 3 minutes of the last forced reboot about an hour ago, there were 3 hits logged, 1 IP in Egypt, another in Poland and a regular visit from a proxy server in Paris. Sometimes I see groups of attacks - Saturday night there were 5 hits in 8 seconds, each from a different IP in Turkey, closely followed by several others, including an online shop in Germany (presumably a compromised server).

I'm considering buying a good Billion router and an ISP change is on the way.

The Smoothwall type option would still need to sit inside the modem connection, yes? That would still mean installing a 'stronger', cooler running? router to hold the connection up, wouldn't it?

 

My point with the smoothwall type operation is to limit what can get out and what can get in. So even if your current modem is on the outside of the smoothwall box you can configure it so the "problem PC" has no access to the modem. Thus it cannot reboot it.

You would not need a new modem as you are just adding another component into your network. The modem would treat the smoothwall box like a regular client PC.

 

I understand what you're saying but it's the attacks from the outside that are forcing the router to reboot; the problem machine has been clean for some two weeks now.