Review of the CUJO Smart Firewall and Money Saving Deals
I have to admit I was pretty excited when I was asked to check out the new Cujo Smart Firewall. Up until recently, the idea of a firewall to protect entire networks was something you only saw at the business level. To have one device that could protect my home network and it not be cost prohibitive?!? I’m in!
Not only was I excited to try out the internet security protection, but I was also intrigued with the parental control features. As many of you know, anything that can assist me with messing with my kids is top notch in my book. So the idea of being able to pause their internet by device or filter out certain sites……sounds fun to me LOL! Besides having fun with the kids, it’s always good to have the ability to filter certain content or set limits on internet use.
Let’s dig right in and go over some of the key features of the Cujo Smart Firewall. Also don’t forget to save 20% off with our exclusive CUJO coupon code.
Cujo Smart Firewall – Features
The Cujo Smart Firewall for your home network comes packed with some great features, especially for the price! More on that later though. First let’s touch on these key functions.
Business-Level Internet Security
As I mentioned, to have this level of security for you home network, amazing! One of the best parts, unlike most business firewalls, you don’t have to set up a slew of complicated rules in order to get protected. The Cujo Smart Firewall learns and adapts to your network and uses data collected from many sources to protect you from malicious sites and malware.
Protects All Smart Devices in Your Home
This is a huge feature and something that will help the overall security of the internet. Currently many smart devices have no protection and are easy for people looking to do malice to use. The DynDNS DDOS attack last year has shown this. They were able to use many smart devices (televisions, smart home, cameras etc.) to carry out the attack.
Great Parental Controls
- Parental controls for all devices / users
- Internet filter by category or site
- Set time limits
- Social media monitoring
- Pause the internet by device or profile
- Alerts and reporting
- Remote administration by app
- Set up user profiles and settings
Connect to Home Router, Control With App
Once the Cujo Smart Firewall is connected to your home network you can easily control settings, set up user profiles, pause internet etc.. right from their app. You can find the app in the Apple App Store or Google Play. Set up was a breeze and the interface is clean and easy to use. I appreciate that I can add a password pin (4 to 8 digits) for accessing the app to keep out the people I may want to filter (you know the kids or anyone I want to mess with). Would be nice to see it be compatible with fingerprint authentication though.
1GB Ethernet Connection for Fast Speeds
One of the big concerns I had before getting everything set up was how much speed I would lose. I work from home, I’m online all day and need my speed and connection to be reliable. Also needs to be able to manage multiple connected devices since my family has a ton. We have no less than 15, sometimes up to 20 devices on our network at a time. However after getting everything set up with the Cujo I am pleasantly surprised. So far no loss of speed or connectivity. If anything, since it is blocking some of the malicious connection attempts, I’m seeing better connectivity. Here is a screenshot of a before and after speed test from Speedtest.net.
Before:
After:
As you can see, Ping time improved slightly and download time was a little lower but that test was run with more devices running on network. I only pay for a 250MB maximum speed on download, so really the performance is still where it should be. Upload speed not affected at all.
Cujo Smart Firewall – Pros
- Very little, if any, loss of internet speed.
- Protection for all devices on your network. Including smart TV’s, cameras, gaming systems, phones, etc..
- Easily filter content or pause internet by user / profile / device.
- No need to set up complicated filtering rules like most business firewalls. Cujo’s smart learning features and data collected from all Cujo devices help block threats and malicious traffic automatically.
- Customer Service – my experience with their customer service was great. Helped me through my unique set up and was very knowledgeable. Also appreciated they called as soon as I activated the device to see if I needed help.
Cujo Smart Firewall – Cons
- Depending on your configuration / ISP / Router set up could take a little assistance or fooling around with to get it set up properly. However as I mentioned, their customer service is great and will help you get set up no problem. Once set up you are good to go.
Price of the Cujo Smart Firewall
$249 – one time charge, no monthly subscription.
To Summarize
After using the Cujo Smart Firewall for a few days I’m still really impressed. My internet speeds have held up and I’ve seen no dip in performance of my network. I’ve been watching the logs and seeing the threats that are being blocked across all my devices and am satisfied with the amount of protection. I’ll have a lot less worry moving forward about my kids stumbling onto a malicious website that wants to install malware on their machines. I love that I can mess with my kids and pause their internet with the touch of a button! It’s a great way to get their attention lol.
You can’t go wrong with the Cujo Smart Firewall and I think every home should have one!
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