html - are my files accessible over the internet after port forwarding?

Question

after port forwarding, my computer could be accessible over the internet, can I access my files in the computer from another computer by using xxx.xxx.xxx.xx:xxxx/filename?

question from:https://stackoverflow.com/questions/66057127/are-my-files-accessible-over-the-internet-after-port-forwarding

Answer 1

Port forwarding allows the requests that come to a specific port on your router to be forwarded to a specific port on a computer on your network.

To be able to access files remotely, you should have a service running on that computer to which you forward the traffic to. There are a few protocols that help accessing files this way:

1. FTP/SFTP
2. SMB
3. HTTP
4. LDAP

Etc. So you need to find a server software for any of these protocols and run it the computer where you want to host your files.

PS: Having answered your question, I would not recommend doing this because any software you install would have vulnerabilities (that might be discovered later if not now), and you will have to be aware of all such and keep the software up to date. Instead it would be much safer to use a cloud service to store your files, in which case they would take care of security on an everyday basis.

Having said that, both cloud services and any software you install on your computer, both are prone to "Zero-Day Vulnerabilities" (Vulnerabilites which exist in the software that aren't reported/identified to/by the developers, instead exploited by a malicious attacker).