A rack-mounted Cisco PIX 515 firewall

1996

A Cisco PIX, the appliance that made the dedicated network firewall a normal thing to buy rather than a research idea. Cisco acquired the PIX in 1995 and it dominated the perimeter through the late 1990s, the years when 'security' still largely meant 'a hard shell around a soft network'. The subject dates from 1996; the photograph itself is later.