NAS box in Routers DMZ, a good idea?

[pjgtech]

Hi all....

I have finally bought myself a NAS box (LG NAS N2A2 2Tb in RAID).

Networking is not one of my strong points so I'm after a bit of advice....

I have set it all up, (which was surprisingly easy) put all my data on it and it works fine with all my pc's being able to connect and access it via the home network (via a Belkin N1 MIMO router - Model F5D8231uk4 )

But, I have had no end of trouble getting the web based remote access features working. Basically I could not enable the web access for the NAS, and I think the problem is my router rather than the NAS box.

Port forwarding didn't work (although I may have put in the wrong settings) but placing the IP address for the NAS box in the DMZ on the router does enable net remote access to work fine.

So my question is this.... Is it safe to leave the NAS box in the routers DMZ all the time, so that I can get web acces remotely when I need it? Or, should I only enable this when I know I need to use it?

As I understand it the DMZ is outside the "safe" bit of the routers system? So can others get access to it?

(NB: I have used a good strong password (long, with lower and upper case letters with numbers and no proper words).

Any advice would be appreciated, thanx....

BTW, I recommend this router, very good for home use (or small office even).

 

[Hodders]

To be honest if we are talking about a home network then the whole green/dmz networking paradigm loses a bit of relevance.

Ask yourself the following:

1) Is there vital highly sensitive data on the NAS ?
2) Is a port forward from the whole internet to your NAS box a good idea ?
3) Would a VPN setup be a more secure solution - if your router supports a DMZ it may well function as a VPN endpoint.

Keep playing as networking is good fun.