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Synthwave1337-5898 avatar image
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Synthwave1337-5898 asked cheong00 answered

Allow Windows Apps such as Flight Simulator in firewall

My Windows firewall doesn't allow all outgoing traffic, I want to control it by myself.
How can I explicitly allow outgoing traffic for a windows app that is running for example as "\device\harddiskvolume29\flightsimulator.exe". It's some some kind of virtual device that's pointing to "C:\Program Files\WindowsApps\Flight Simulator..." and it doesn't work if I allow the first path nor the second. What do I need to do here?

windows-10-security
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Reza-Ameri avatar image
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Reza-Ameri answered

You just have to add regular location like C:\Program Files\WindowsApps\Flight Simulator and not the virtual directory and it should work as expected.
You may add it in Allowed list in Firewall.

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SunnyQi-MSFT avatar image
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SunnyQi-MSFT answered

Hi,

Welcome to Q&A platform.

If you want to allow a specific application to pass through the Windows Defender firewall, you need to add the app in Allow an app or feature through Windows Defender Firewall.

Control Panel->System Security->Windows Defender Firewall->Allow apps to communicate through Windows Defender Firewall->Click the Change settings button->

Check the app or feature you want to allow through the firewall on Windows 10->Check on which type of networks an app can access the network->Click the OK button. Once you complete the steps, the app will now access the network freely.

Quick tip: If the app isn’t on the list, click the Allow another app button to locate the application you want to allow.

119686-image.png

Meanwhile, if you want to an app from Outbound rules of Windows Firewall, you could create a new rule with rule type Program and insert the app's path as the following screenshot:

119610-image.png

Best Regards,
Sunny


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Synthwave1337-5898 avatar image
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Synthwave1337-5898 answered vk-1478 published

Hey,

thanks for your answers.
I've already created an outbound rule for the file "c:\program files\windowsapps\microsoft.....\flightsimulator.exe" manually. Every protocol, IP and port is allowed. I double checked the correct path name with the current version. Still the game tells me to "insert the game disc" (which I don't have, I have bought it via the windows store as a download) and in the windows event log I can see that "\device\harddiskvolume29\flightsimulator.exe" is rejected by the firewall.
It works if I allow all outbound traffic but that's not what I want. It works with other programs, only these WindowsApps cause these Problems. Allowing an IP range seems also not an option because I simply don't know all the IPs or ranges the game is using.

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I found out that it does work when I mount the virtual device to a drive letter and allow the exe on this mounted drive. It's a bit of a hassle because the virtual device is created with a temporary unique id the first time the game is started after a windows start as it seems.
But I can solve this issue with a small powershell script that iterates through the unmounted devices right after the game has started and keeps the device with the wanted exe on it mounted while the game is running.

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cheong00 avatar image
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cheong00 answered

If you have enabled UPnP the game itself should open the necessary port for you.

Otherwise, here's the guide for ports that you can explicitly open for it to work (which is useful if your machine is behind a broadband router and need to setup port forwarding).


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