Smoothwall (formerly styled as SmoothWall) is a Linux distribution designed to be used as an open source firewall. Smoothwall is configured via a web-based GUI and requires little or no knowledge of Linux to install or use.
Smoothwall is also a private software company based in the UK who specializes in the development of web content filtering, safeguarding and internet security solutions, which also maintains the SmoothWall open source project.
History
Smoothwall began life as Smoothwall GPL in 2000 as a freely redistributable piece of open source software. In 2001, they released a proprietary version that is currently the primary distribution of the software containing extra features. Smoothwall still maintains its open source version with Smoothwall Express (latest release V3.1 in 2014). Smoothwall's filtering and safeguarding products are typically sold into educational organizations and businesses.
In 2017, Smoothwall announced a management buyout backed by private equity fund, Tenzing. The new management team was led by Georg Ell, previously Director of Western Europe at Tesla, who was appointed as Group CEO in May 2018. Georg was joined by existing Board members Gavin Logan, Douglas Hanley and Manprit Randhawan in the management of the Smoothwall business, along with Lisa Stone, who took the position as chairperson.
On 5 August 2021, Tenzing announced they had agreed to sell their investment in Smoothwall to Australian security firm Family Zone Cyber Safety for £75.5 million (A$142m cash consideration.) The deal was completed on 17 August 2021, with a £10.5m deferred balance of the sale price paid on 1 September 2021.
Smoothwall Express
Smoothwall Express, originally Smoothwall GPL, is the freely distributable version of Smoothwall, developed by the Smoothwall Open Source Project team and members of Smoothwall Ltd.
Released in August 2000, Smoothwall GPL was developed by Lawrence Manning and Richard Morrell to provide a quick and easy-to-use solution to the problem of sharing their ISDN connections with the rest of their LAN. Created using Red Hat Linux, Smoothwall GPL originally had two simple functions: control the modem to dial and hang up, and to route TCP/IP packets from the LAN to the Internet connection, and back again. The LAN was hidden from the public network by NAT, applied using ipchains.
Beginning with 0.9 in August 2000, the Smoothwall GPL 0.9.x series went through several versions based on the 2.2 Linux kernel, culminating in 0.9.9 SE in December 2001, which was probably the most popular GPL release. Each release led to a number of improvements, including PAT (port address translation), DMZ, PSTN and ISDN dial-up support, broadband (ADSL and Cable) support.
Smoothwall GPL 1.0 was released in December 2002, including all previously released patches and security fixes, and ended development of the 0.9.x/1.0 series, although it was supported by errata updates for another year and a half.<!-- This needs to be brought up to date. -->