IPSEC VPN on a wireless network

[hseth]

How good is VPN in securing the client machine itself when used on a wireless network. I am aware that VPN can very well protect the data from client to the gateway but if it's implemented without the split tunelling, the client is only suppose to talk to the VPN gateway but does it protect the machine itself? Can someone else other the gateway talk or see the client machine on the wireless network?

[rwcrowe]

Unless the VPN client has some type of statefull firewall it only provides transport. Cisco VPN client has a statefull firewall built-in. The wireless network is basically and extension of your lan. So lan users can access the wireless clients, other wireless clients can access other wireless clients.