Yes, they can.
Firewalls in general have some benefits, such as improved restriction of unauthorised traffic. Software firewalls, as compared to hardware firewalls are also better able to monitor computer activity as they can know exactly which programs are requesting to connect to a network.
Firewalls restricts traffic onto a network or onto an individual system. Firewalls can restrict users, web sites, and files from being moved across the network.
Firewalls
To identify potential holes in network firewalls
the server that contains the network firewalls configurations
Avg Linkscanner, Autoscan Network and Arovax shield are some free brands of spam firewalls. Spam firewalls track sources of spam email and filter them into a spam folder so that the user does not need to manage them. The spam firewall is kept up-to-date on sites to filter through an auto-update mechanism from the manufacturer.
to prevent unauthorized persons from gaining access to a private network
Between the server / router and the internet router.
Are there any firewalls on the network. A lot of people configure firewalls in weird ways, leading to some strange network behaviour. Could be that you have a firewall blocking all your outgoing icmp, thus explaining the lack of ping success, but success with ipconfig /renew.
routers
usally Firewalls config for comunicate to another network Firewall located in edge of network,firewall is a roter or a pc with a special software.