In the military, this is the boundary between two or more groups where military activity is not permitted, usually because of some treaty. In computer networks, the DMZ is a network or portion of the network separated from other systems by a firewall. The firewall lets only certain types of network traffic enter or exit. Many companies protect their internal networks from the Internet using a firewall but have a separate DMZ to which the public can have only limited access. For example, public Web servers might be located in the DMZ.

See Also: Firewall; Internet.