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[solved] Firewalld disable AllowZoneDrifting

3 min readMay 7, 2025
firewalld

AllowZoneDrifting is a legacy feature in firewalld that lets network traffic be evaluated by multiple security zones, potentially allowing a more permissive rule to apply. It was originally introduced to simplify mixed-zone setups, but it creates unpredictable behavior and weakens security by allowing traffic to “leak” through zones that should be restricted. Because it makes firewall rules harder to understand and opens the door to unintended access, it’s considered insecure and should be disabled in modern environments.

when you issue a systemctl status firewalld command you might be presented with the below which indicates your config is still having a AllowZoneDrifting active.

firewalld.service - firewalld - dynamic firewall daemon
Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/system/firewalld.service; enabled; vendor preset: enabled)
Active: active (running) since Wed 2025-05-07 13:39:54 GMT; 13min ago
Docs: man:firewalld(1)
Main PID: 1574 (firewalld)
Tasks: 2 (limit: 99882)
Memory: 39.6M
CGroup: /system.slice/firewalld.service
└─1574 /usr/libexec/platform-python -s /usr/sbin/firewalld --nofork --nopid

May 07 13:39:54 localhost.localdomain systemd[1]: Starting firewalld - dynamic firewall daemon...
May 07 13:39:54 localhost.localdomain systemd[1]: Started firewalld - dynamic firewall daemon.
May 07 13:39:54…

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Johan Louwers
Johan Louwers

Written by Johan Louwers

Johan Louwers is a technology enthousiasts with a long background in supporting enterprises and startups alike as CTO, Chief Enterprise Architect and developer.

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