Troubleshooting Firewall-Related Issues
Pfirewall.log contains a log of all the dropped and allowed firewall connections.
The default log path is C:\Windows\system32\LogFiles\Firewall\pfirewall.log
Generating a Firewall Packet Log
You can enable packet logging on all profiles by using the following netshell commands:
"netsh advfirewall>set allprofiles logging allowedconnections enable"
"netsh advfirewall>set allprofiles logging droppedconnections enable"
Diagnosing the Windows Filtering Platform Behavior
The Windows Firewall is layered on top of WFP which provides the actual enforcement of the firewall rules through traffic filters derived from the firewall policy. The following steps will let you trace in the event viewer what happened in WFP while you reproduce the problem that you want to debug.
To enable WFP auditing:
auditpol /set /subcategory:"Filtering Platform Packet Drop" /success:enable /failure:enable
auditpol /set /subcategory:"Filtering Platform Connection" /success:enable /failure:enable
auditpol /set /subcategory:"IPsec Driver" /success:enable /failure:enable
auditpol /set /subcategory:"IPsec Main Mode" /success:enable /failure:enable
auditpol /set /subcategory:"IPsec Quick Mode" /success:enable /failure:enable
auditpol /set /subcategory:"IPsec Extended Mode" /success:enable /failure:enable
Repro the failure
To disable WFP auditing:
auditpol /set /subcategory:"Filtering Platform Packet Drop" /success:disable /failure:disable
auditpol /set /subcategory:"Filtering Platform Connection" /success: disable /failure:disable
auditpol /set /subcategory:"IPsec Driver" /success:disable /failure:disable
auditpol /set /subcategory:"IPsec Main Mode" /success:disable /failure:disable
auditpol /set /subcategory:"IPsec Quick Mode" /success:disable /failure:disable
auditpol /set /subcategory:"IPsec Extended Mode" /success:disable /failure:disable