Security Quick-Start HOWTO for Red Hat Linux
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5. Step 3: Firewalls and Setting Access Policies

So what is a "firewall"? It's a vague term that can mean anything that acts as a protective barrier between us and the outside world. This can be a dedicated system, or a specific application that provides this functionality. Or it can be a combination of components, including various combinations of hardware and software. Firewalls are built from "rules" that are used to define what is allowed to enter and exit a given system or network. Let's look at some of the possible components that are readily available for Linux, and how we might implement a reasonably safe firewalling strategy.

In Step 1 above, we have turned off all services we don't need. In our example, there were a few we still needed to have running. In this section, we will take the next step here and decide which we need to leave open to the world. And which we might be able to restrict in some way. If we can block them all, so much the better, but this is not always practical.

5.1. Strategy

What we want to do now is restrict connections and traffic so that we only allow the minimum necessary for whatever our particular situation is. In some cases we may want to block all incoming "new" connection attempts. Example: we want to run X, but don't want anyone from outside to access it, so we'll block it completely from outside connections. In other situations, we may want to limit, or restrict, incoming connections to trusted sources only. The more restrictive, the better. Example: we want to ssh into our system from outside, but we only ever do this from our workplace. So we'll limit sshd connections to our workplace address range. There are various ways to do this, and we'll look at the most common ones.

We also will not want to limit our firewall to any one application. There is nothing wrong with a "layered" defense-in-depth approach. Our front line protection will be a packet filter -- either ipchains or iptables (see below). Then we can use additional tools and mechanisms to reinforce our firewall.

We will include some brief examples. Our rule of thumb will be to deny everything as the default policy, then open up just what we need. We'll try to keep this as simple as possible since it can be an involved and complex topic, and just stick to some of the most basic concepts. See the Links section for further reading on this topic.

5.2. Packet Filters -- Ipchains and Iptables

"Packet filters" (like ipchains) have the ability to look at individual packets, and make decisions based on what they find. These can be used for many purposes. One common purpose is to implement a firewall.

Common packet filters on Linux are ipchains which is standard with 2.2 kernels, and iptables which is available with the more recent 2.4 kernels. iptables has more advanced packet filtering capabilities and is recommended for anyone running a 2.4 kernel. But either can be effective for our purposes. ipfwadm is a similar utility for 2.0 kernels (not discussed here).

If constructing your own ipchains or iptables firewall rules seems a bit daunting, there are various sites that can automate the process. See the Links section. Also the included examples may be used as a starting point. As of Red Hat 7.1, Red Hat is providing init scripts for ipchains and iptables, and gnome-lokkit for generating a very basic set of firewall rules (see below). This may be adequate, but it is still recommended to know the proper syntax and how the various mechanisms work as such tools rarely do more than a few very simple rules.

Note

Various examples are given below. These are presented for illustrative purposes to demonstrate some of the concepts being discussed here. While they might also be useful as a starting point for your own script, please note that they are not meant to be all encompassing. You are strongly encouraged to understand how the scripts work, so you can create something even more tailored for your own situation.

The example scripts are just protecting inbound connections to one interface (the one connected to the Internet). This may be adequate for many simple home type situations, but, conversely, this approach is not adequate for all situations!

5.2.1. ipchains

ipchains can be used with either 2.2 or 2.4 kernels. When ipchains is in place, it checks every packet that moves through the system. The packets move across different "chains", depending where they originate and where they are going. Think of "chains" as rule sets. In advanced configurations, we could define our own custom chains. The three default built-in chains are input, which is incoming traffic, output, which is outgoing traffic, and forward, which is traffic being forwarded from one interface to another (typically used for "masquerading"). Chains can be manipulated in various ways to control the flow of traffic in and out of our system. Rules can be added at our discretion to achieve the desired result.

At the end of every "chain" is a "target". The target is specified with the -j option to the command. The target is what decides the fate of the packet and essentially terminates that particular chain. The most common targets are mostly self-explanatory: ACCEPT, DENY, REJECT, and MASQ. MASQ is for "ipmasquerading". DENY and REJECT essentially do the same thing, though in different ways. Is one better than the other? That is the subject of much debate, and depends on other factors that are beyond the scope of this document. For our purposes, either should suffice.

ipchains has a very flexible configuration. Port (or port ranges), interfaces, destination address, source address can be specified, as well as various other options. The man page explains these details well enough that we won't get into specifics here.

Traffic entering our system from the Internet, enters via the input chain. This is the one that we need as tight as we can make it.

Below is a brief example script for a hypothetical system. We'll let the comments explain what this script does. Anything starting with a "#" is a comment. ipchains rules are generally incorporated into shell scripts, using shell variables to help implement the firewalling logic. 


#!/bin/sh
#
# ipchains.sh
#
# An example of a simple ipchains configuration. 
#
# This script allows ALL outbound traffic, and denies 
# ALL inbound connection attempts from the outside.
#
###################################################################
# Begin variable declarations and user configuration options ######
#
IPCHAINS=/sbin/ipchains
# This is the WAN interface, that is our link to the outside world.
# For pppd and pppoe users.
# WAN_IFACE="ppp0"
WAN_IFACE="eth0"

## end user configuration options #################################
###################################################################

# The high ports used mostly for connections we initiate and return
# traffic.
LOCAL_PORTS=`cat /proc/sys/net/ipv4/ip_local_port_range |cut -f1`:\
`cat /proc/sys/net/ipv4/ip_local_port_range |cut -f2`

# Any and all addresses from anywhere.
ANYWHERE="0/0"

# Let's start clean and flush all chains to an empty state.
$IPCHAINS -F  

# Set the default policies of the built-in chains. If no match for any 
# of the rules below, these will be the defaults that ipchains uses.
$IPCHAINS -P forward DENY
$IPCHAINS -P output ACCEPT
$IPCHAINS -P input DENY 

# Accept localhost/loopback traffic.
$IPCHAINS -A input -i lo -j ACCEPT

# Get our dynamic IP now from the Inet interface. WAN_IP will be our
# IP address we are protecting from the outside world. Put this
# here, so default policy gets set, even if interface is not up
# yet.
WAN_IP=`ifconfig $WAN_IFACE |grep inet |cut -d : -f 2 |cut -d \  -f 1`

# Bail out with error message if no IP available! Default policy is 
# already set, so all is not lost here.
[ -z "$WAN_IP" ] && echo "$WAN_IFACE not configured, aborting." && exit 1

# Accept non-SYN TCP, and UDP connections to LOCAL_PORTS. These are
# the high, unprivileged ports (1024 to 4999 by default). This will
# allow return connection traffic for connections that we initiate
# to outside sources. TCP connections are opened with 'SYN' packets.
$IPCHAINS -A input -p tcp -s $ANYWHERE -d $WAN_IP $LOCAL_PORTS ! -y -j ACCEPT 

# We can't be so selective with UDP since that protocol does not
# know about SYNs.
$IPCHAINS -A input -p udp -s $ANYWHERE -d $WAN_IP $LOCAL_PORTS -j ACCEPT 

## ICMP (ping)
#
# ICMP rules, allow the bare essential types of ICMP only. Ping
# request is blocked, ie we won't respond to someone else's pings,
# but can still ping out. 
$IPCHAINS -A input  -p icmp  --icmp-type echo-reply \
   -s $ANYWHERE -i $WAN_IFACE -j ACCEPT
$IPCHAINS -A input  -p icmp  --icmp-type destination-unreachable \
   -s $ANYWHERE -i $WAN_IFACE -j ACCEPT
$IPCHAINS -A input  -p icmp  --icmp-type time-exceeded \
   -s $ANYWHERE -i $WAN_IFACE -j ACCEPT

###################################################################
# Set the catchall, default rule to DENY, and log it all. All other
# traffic not allowed by the rules above, winds up here, where it is
# blocked and logged. This is the default policy for this chain
# anyway, so we are just adding the logging ability here with '-l'.
# Outgoing traffic is allowed as the default policy for the 'output'
# chain. There are no restrictions on that.

$IPCHAINS -A input -l -j DENY

echo "Ipchains firewall is up `date`."

##-- eof ipchains.sh

To use the above script would require that it is executable (i.e. chmod +x ipchains.sh), and run by root to build the chains, and hence the firewall.

To summarize what this example did was to start by setting some shell variables in the top section, to be used later in the script. Then we set the default rules (ipchains calls these "policies") of denying all inbound and forwarded traffic, and of allowing all our own outbound traffic. We had to open some holes in the high, unprivileged ports so that we could have return traffic from connections that bigcat initiates to outside addresses. If we connect to someone's web server, we want that HTML data to be able to get back to us, for instance. The same applies to other network traffic. We then allowed a few specific types of the ICMP protocol (most are still blocked). We are also logging any inbound traffic that violates any of our rules so we know who is doing what. Notice that we are only using IP address here, not hostnames of any kind. This is so that our firewall works, even in situation where there may be DNS failures. Also, to prevent any kind of DNS spoofing.

See the ipchains man page for a full explanation of syntax. The important ones we used here are:

 -A input: Adds a rule to the "input" chain. The default chains are input, output, and forward.

 -p udp: This rule only applies to the "UDP" "protocol". The -p option can be used with tcp, udp or icmp protocols.

 -i $WAN_IFACE: This rule applies to the specified interface only, and applies to whatever chain is referenced (input, output, or forward).

 -s <IP address> [port]: This rule only applies to the source address as specified. It can optionally have a port (e.g. 22) immediately afterward, or port range, e.g. 1023:4999.

 -d <IP address> [port]: This rule only applies to the destination address as specified. Also, it may include port or port range.

 -l : Any packet that hits a rule with this option is logged (lower case "L").

 -j ACCEPT: Jumps to the "ACCEPT" "target". This effectively terminates this chain and decides the ultimate fate for this particular packet, which in this example is to "ACCEPT" it. The same is true for other -j targets like DENY.

By and large, the order in which command line options are specified is not significant. The chain name (e.g. input) must come first though.

Remember in Step 1 when we ran netstat, we had both X and print servers running among other things. We don't want these exposed to the Internet, even in a limited way. These are still happily running on bigcat, but are now safe and sound behind our ipchains based firewall. You probably have other services that fall in this category as well.

The above example is a simplistic all or none approach. We allow all our own outbound traffic (not necessarily a good idea), and block all inbound connection attempts from outside. It is only protecting one interface, and really just the inbound side of that interface. It would more than likely require a bit of fine tuning to make it work for you. For a more advanced set of rules, see the Appendix. And you might want to read http://tldp.org/HOWTO/IPCHAINS-HOWTO.html.

Whenever you have made changes to your firewall, you should verify its integrity. One step to make sure your rules seem to be doing what you intended, is to see how ipchains has interpreted your script. You can do this by opening your xterm very wide, and issuing the following command:


 # ipchains -L -n -v | less

The output is grouped according to chain. You should also find a way to scan yourself (see the Verifying section below). And then keep an eye on your logs to make sure you are blocking what is intended.

5.2.2. iptables

iptables is the next generation packet filter for Linux, and requires a 2.4 kernel. It can do everything ipchains can, but has a number of noteworthy enhancements. The syntax is similar to ipchains in many respects. See the man page for details.

The most noteworthy enhancement is "connection tracking", also known as "stateful inspection". This gives iptables more knowledge of the state of each packet. Not only does it know if the packet is a TCP or UDP packet, or whether it has the SYN or ACK flags set, but also if it is part of an existing connection, or related somehow to an existing connection. The implications for firewalling should be obvious.

The bottom line is that it is easier to get a tight firewall with iptables, than with ipchains. So this is the recommended way to go.

Here is the same script as above, revised for iptables: 


#!/bin/sh
#
# iptables.sh
#
# An example of a simple iptables configuration. 
#
# This script allows ALL outbound traffic, and denies 
# ALL inbound connection attempts from the Internet interface only.
#
###################################################################
# Begin variable declarations and user configuration options ######
#
IPTABLES=/sbin/iptables
# Local Interfaces
# This is the WAN interface that is our link to the outside world.
# For pppd and pppoe users.
# WAN_IFACE="ppp0"
WAN_IFACE="eth0"
#

## end user configuration options #################################
###################################################################

# Any and all addresses from anywhere.
ANYWHERE="0/0"

# This module may need to be loaded:
modprobe ip_conntrack_ftp

# Start building chains and rules #################################
#
# Let's start clean and flush all chains to an empty state.
$IPTABLES -F  

# Set the default policies of the built-in chains. If no match for any 
# of the rules below, these will be the defaults that IPTABLES uses.
$IPTABLES -P FORWARD DROP
$IPTABLES -P OUTPUT ACCEPT
$IPTABLES -P INPUT DROP

# Accept localhost/loopback traffic.
$IPTABLES -A INPUT -i lo -j ACCEPT

## ICMP (ping)
#
# ICMP rules, allow the bare essential types of ICMP only. Ping
# request is blocked, ie we won't respond to someone else's pings,
# but can still ping out.
$IPTABLES -A INPUT  -p icmp  --icmp-type echo-reply \
   -s $ANYWHERE -i $WAN_IFACE -j ACCEPT
$IPTABLES -A INPUT  -p icmp  --icmp-type destination-unreachable \
   -s $ANYWHERE -i $WAN_IFACE -j ACCEPT
$IPTABLES -A INPUT  -p icmp  --icmp-type time-exceeded \
   -s $ANYWHERE -i $WAN_IFACE -j ACCEPT

###################################################################
# Set the catchall, default rule to DENY, and log it all. All other
# traffic not allowed by the rules above, winds up here, where it is
# blocked and logged. This is the default policy for this chain
# anyway, so we are just adding the logging ability here with '-j
# LOG'. Outgoing traffic is allowed as the default policy for the
# 'output' chain. There are no restrictions on that.

$IPTABLES -A INPUT -m state --state ESTABLISHED,RELATED -j ACCEPT
$IPTABLES -A INPUT -m state --state NEW -i ! $WAN_IFACE -j ACCEPT
$IPTABLES -A INPUT -j LOG -m limit --limit 30/minute --log-prefix "Dropping: "

echo "Iptables firewall is up `date`."

##-- eof iptables.sh

The same script logic is used here, and thus this does pretty much the same exact thing as the ipchains script in the previous section. There are some subtle differences as to syntax. Note the case difference in the chain names for one (e.g. INPUT vs input). Logging is handled differently too. It has its own "target" now (-j LOG), and is much more flexible.

There are some very fundamental differences as well, that might not be so obvious. Remember this section from the ipchains script:


# Accept non-SYN TCP, and UDP connections to LOCAL_PORTS. These are the high,
# unprivileged ports (1024 to 4999 by default). This will allow return
# connection traffic for connections that we initiate to outside sources.
# TCP connections are opened with 'SYN' packets. We have already opened 
# those services that need to accept SYNs for, so other SYNs are excluded here
# for everything else.
$IPCHAINS -A input -p tcp -s $ANYWHERE -d $WAN_IP $LOCAL_PORTS ! -y -j ACCEPT 

# We can't be so selective with UDP since that protocol does not know 
# about SYNs.
$IPCHAINS -A input -p udp -s $ANYWHERE -d $WAN_IP $LOCAL_PORTS -j ACCEPT

We jumped through hoops here with ipchains so that we could restrict unwanted, incoming connections as much as possible. A bit of a kludge, actually.

That section is missing from the iptables version. It is not needed as connection tracking handles this quite nicely, and then some. This is due to the "statefulness" of iptables. It knows more about each packet than ipchains. For instance, it knows whether the packet is part of a "new" connection, or an "established" connection, or a "related" connection. This is the so-called "stateful inspection" of connection tracking.

There are many, many features of iptables that are not touched on here. For more reading on the Netfilter project and iptables, see http://netfilter.samba.org. And for a more advanced set of rules, see the Appendix.

5.2.3. Red Hat Firewall Configuration Tools

Red Hat has not included firewall configuration tools until 7.1, when the GUI utility gnome-lokkit started being bundled. gnome-lokkit does a minimalist set of rules for ipchains only. Explicit support for iptables configuration is not an option, despite the fact that the default kernel is 2.4.

gnome-lokkit is an option on non-upgrade installs, and can also be run as a stand-alone app any time after installation. It will ask a few simple questions, and dump the resulting rule-set into /etc/sysconfig/ipchains.

As mentioned, this is a fairly minimalist set of rules, and possibly a sufficient starting point. An example /etc/sysconfig/ipchains created by gnome-lokkit: 


 # Firewall configuration written by lokkit
 # Manual customization of this file is not recommended.
 # Note: ifup-post will punch the current nameservers through the
 #       firewall; such entries will *not* be listed here.
 :input ACCEPT
 :forward ACCEPT
 :output ACCEPT
 -A input -s 0/0 -d 0/0 80 -p tcp -y -j ACCEPT
 -A input -s 0/0 -d 0/0 25 -p tcp -y -j ACCEPT
 -A input -s 0/0 -d 0/0 22 -p tcp -y -j ACCEPT
 -A input -s 0/0 -d 0/0 23 -p tcp -y -j ACCEPT
 -A input -s 0/0 -d 0/0 -i lo -j ACCEPT
 -A input -s 0/0 -d 0/0 -i eth1 -j ACCEPT
 -A input -s 127.0.0.1 53 -d 0/0 -p udp -j ACCEPT
 -A input -s 0/0 -d 0/0 -p tcp -y -j REJECT
 -A input -s 0/0 -d 0/0 -p udp -j REJECT

This is in a format that can be read by the ipchains command ipchains-restore. Consequently, a new or modified set or rules can be generated with the ipchains-save, and redirecting the output to this file. ipchains-restore is indeed how the ipchains init script processes this file. So for this to work, the ipchains service must be activated: 


 # chkconfig ipchains on

Conversely, if you want to roll your own iptables rules instead, you should make sure the ipchains init service is disabled. There is also an iptables init script, that works much the same as the ipchains version. There is just no support from gnome-lokkit at this time.

5.3. Tcpwrappers (libwrap)

Tcpwrappers provides much the same desired results as ipchains and iptables above, though works quite differently. Tcpwrappers actually intercepts the connection attempt, then examines its configurations files, and decides whether to accept or reject the request. Tcpwrappers controls access at the application level, rather than the socket level like iptables and ipchains. This can be quite effective, and is a standard component on most Linux systems.

Tcpwrappers consists of the configuration files /etc/hosts.allow and /etc/hosts.deny. The functionality is provided by the libwrap library.

Tcpwrappers first looks to see if access is permitted in /etc/hosts.allow, and if so, access is granted. If not in /etc/hosts.allow, the file /etc/hosts.deny is then checked to see if access is not allowed. If so, access is denied. Else, access is granted. For this reason, /etc/hosts.deny should contain only one uncommented line, and that is: ALL: ALL. Access should then be permitted through entries in /etc/hosts.allow, where specific services are listed, along with the specific host addresses allowed to access these services. While hostnames can be used here, use of hostnames opens the limited possibility for name spoofing.

Tcpwrappers is commonly used to protect services that are started via inetd (or xinetd). But also any program that has been compiled with libwrap support, can take advantage of it. Just don't assume that all programs have built in libwrap support -- they do not. In fact, most probably don't. So we will only use it in our examples here to protect services start via inetd. And then rely on our packet filtering firewall, or other mechanism, to protect non-(x)inetd services.

Below is a small snippet from a typical inetd.conf file:


 # Pop and imap mail services et al
 #
 #pop-2   stream  tcp     nowait  root    /usr/sbin/tcpd ipop2d
 #pop-3   stream  tcp     nowait  root    /usr/sbin/tcpd ipop3d
 #imap    stream  tcp     nowait  root    /usr/sbin/tcpd imapd
 #

The second to last column is the tcpwrappers daemon -- /usr/sbin/tcpd. Immediately after is the daemon it is protecting. In this case, POP and IMAP mail servers. Your distro probably has already done this part for you. For the few applications that have built-in support for tcpwrappers via the libwrap library, specifying the daemon as above is not necessary.

We will use the same principles here: default policy is to deny everything, then open holes to allow the minimal amount of traffic necessary.

So now with your text editor, su to root and open /etc/hosts.deny. If it does not exist, then create it. It is just a plain text file. We want the following line: 


 ALL: ALL

If it is there already, fine. If not, add it in and then save and close file. Easy enough. "ALL" is one of the keywords that tcpwrappers understands. The format is $SERVICE_NAME : $WHO, so we are denying all connections to all services here. At least all services that are using tcpwrappers. Remember, this will primarily be inetd services. See man 5 hosts_access for details on the syntax of these files. Note the "5" there!

Now let's open up just the services we need, as restrictively as we can, with a brief example:


 ALL: 127.0.0.1
 sshd,ipop3d: 192.168.1.
 sshd: .myworkplace.com, hostess.mymomshouse.com

The first line allows all "localhost" connections. You will need this. The second allows connections to the sshd and ipop3d services from IP addresses that start with 192.168.1., in this case the private address range for our hypothetical home LAN. Note the trailing ".". It's important. The third line allows connections to only our sshd daemon from any host associated with .myworkplace.com. Note the leading "." in this example. And then also, the single host hostess.mymomshouse.com. In summary, localhost and all our LAN connections have access to any and all tcpwrappered services on bigcat. But only our workplace addresses, and our mother can use sshd on bigcat from outside connections. Everybody else is denied by the default policy in /etc/hosts.deny.

The types of wild cards above (.myworkplace.com and 192.168.1.) are not supported by ipchains and iptables, or most other Linux applications for that matter. Also, tcpwrappers can use hostnames in place of IP addresses which is quite handy in some situations. This does not work with ipchains and iptables.

You can test your tcpwrappers configuration with the included tcpdchk utility (see the man page). Note that at this time this does not work with xinetd, and may not even be included in this case.

There is nothing wrong with using both tcpwrappers and a packet filtering firewall like ipchains. In fact, it is recommended to use a "layered" approach. This helps guard against accidental misconfigurations. In this case, each connection will be tested by the packet filter rules first, then tcpwrappers.

Remember to make backup copies before editing system configuration files, restart the daemon afterward, and then check the logs for error messages.

5.3.1. xinetd

As mentioned, xinetd is an enhanced inetd , and replaces inetd as of Red Hat 7.0. It has much of the same functionality, with some notable enhancements. One is that tcpwrappers support be is compiled in, eliminating the need for explicit references to tcpd. Which means /etc/hosts.allow and /etc/hosts.deny are automatically in effect.

Some of xinetd's other enhancements: specify IP address to listen on, which is a very effective method of access control; limit the rate of incoming connections and the total number of simultaneous connections; limit services to specific times of day. See the xinetd and xinetd.conf man pages for more details.

The syntax is quite different though. An example from /etc/xinetd.d/tftp:


 service tftp
 {
        socket_type     = dgram
        bind            = 192.168.1.1
        instances       = 2
        protocol        = udp
        wait            = yes
        user            = nobody
        only_from       = 192.168.1.0
        server          = /usr/sbin/in.tftpd
        server_args     = /tftpboot
        disable         = no
 }

Notice the bind statement. We are only listening on, or "binding" to, the private, LAN interface here. No outside connections can be made since the outside port is not even opened. We are also only accepting connections from 192.168.1.0, our LAN. For xinetd's purposes, this denotes any IP address beginning with "192.168.1". Note that the syntax is different from inetd. The server statement in this case is the tftp daemon, in.tftpd. Again, this assumes that libwrap/tcpwrappers support is compiled into xinetd. The user running the daemon will be "nobody". Yes, there is a user account called "nobody", and it is wise to run such daemons as non-root users whenever possible. Lastly, the disable statement is xinetd's way of turning services on or off. In this case, it is "on". This is on here only as an example. Do NOT run tftp as a public service as it is unsafe.

5.4. PortSentry

Portsentry works quite differently than the other tools discussed so far. Portsentry does what its name implies -- it guards ports. Portsentry is configured with the /etc/portsentry/portsentry.conf file.

Unlike the other applications discussed above, it does this by actually becoming the listening server on those ports. Kind of like baiting a trap. Running netstat -taup as root while portsentry is running, will show portsentry as the LISTENER on whatever ports portsentry is configured for. If portsentry senses a connection attempt, it blocks it completely. And then goes a step further and blocks the route to that host to stop all further traffic. Alternately, ipchains or iptables can be used to block the host completely. So it makes an excellent tool to stop port scanning of a range of ports.

But portsentry has limited flexibility as to whether it allows a given connection. It is pretty much all or nothing. You can define specific IP addresses that it will ignore in /etc/portsentry/portsentry.ignore. But you cannot allow selective access to individual ports. This is because only one server can bind to a particular port at the same time, and in this case that is portsentry itself. So it has limited usefulness as a stand-alone firewall. As part of an overall firewall strategy, yes, it can be quite useful. For most of us, it should not be our first line of defense, and we should only use it in conjunction with other tools.

Suggestion on when portsentry might be useful:

All in all, the packet filters make for a better firewall.

5.5. Proxies

The dictionary defines "proxy" as "the authority or power to act on behalf of another". This pretty well describes software proxies as well. It is an intermediary in the connection path. As an example, if we were using a web proxy like "squid" (http://www.squid-cache.org/), every time we browse to a web site, we would actually be connecting to our locally running squid server. Squid in turn, would relay our request to the ultimate, real destination. And then squid would relay the web pages back to us. It is a go-between. Like "firewalls", a "proxy" can refer to either a specific application, or a dedicated server which runs a proxy application.

Proxies can perform various duties, not all of which have much to do with security. But the fact that they are an intermediary, makes them a good place to enforce access control policies, limit direct connections through a firewall, and control how the network behind the proxy looks to the Internet. So this makes them strong candidates to be part of an overall firewall strategy. And, in fact, are sometimes used instead of packet filtering firewalls. Proxy based firewalls probably make more sense where many users are behind the same firewall. And it probably is not high on the list of components necessary for home based systems.

Configuring and administering proxies can be complex, and is beyond the scope of this document. The Firewall and Proxy Server HOWTO, http://tldp.org/HOWTO/Firewall-HOWTO.html, has examples of setting up proxy firewalls. Squid usage is discussed at http://squid-docs.sourceforge.net/latest/html/book1.htm

5.6. Individual Applications

Some servers may have their own access control features. You should check this for each server application you run. We'll only look at a few of the common ones in this section. Man pages, and other application specific documentation, is your friend here. This should be done whether you have confidence in your firewall or not. Again, layers of protection is always best.

As always, anytime you make system changes, backup the configuration file first, restart the appropriate daemon afterward, and then check the appropriate logs for error messages.

5.7. Verifying

The final step after getting your firewall in place, is to verify that it is doing what you intended. You would be wise to do this anytime you make even minor changes to your system configuration.

So how to do this? There are several things you can do.

For our packet filters like ipchains and iptables, we can list all our rules, chains, and associated activity with iptables -nvL | less (substitute ipchains if appropriate). Open your xterm as wide as possible to avoid wrapping long lines.

This should give you an idea if your chains are doing what you think they should. You may want to perform some of the on-line tasks you normally do first: open a few web pages, send and retrieve mail, etc. This will, of course, not give you any information on tcpwrappers or portsentry. tcpdchk can be used to verify tcpwrappers configuration (except with xinetd).

And then, scan yourself. nmap is the scanning tool of choice and is included with recent Red Hat releases, or from http://www.insecure.org/nmap/nmap_download.html. nmap is very flexible, and essentially is a "port prober". In other words, it looks for open ports, among other things. See the nmap man page for details.

If you do run nmap against yourself (e.g. nmap localhost), this should tell you what ports are open -- and visible locally only! Which hopefully by now, is quite different from what can be seen from the outside. So, scan yourself, and then find a trusted friend, or site (see the Links section), to scan you from the outside. Make sure you are not violating your ISPs Terms of Service by port scanning. It may not be allowed, even if the intentions are honorable. Scanning from outside is the best way to know how the rest of the world sees you. This should tell you how well that firewall is working. See the nmap section in the Appendix for some examples on nmap usage.

One caveat on this: some ISPs may filter some ports, and you will not know for sure how well your firewall is working. Conversely, they make it look like certain ports are open by using web, or other, proxies. The scanner may see the web proxy at port 80 and mis-report it as an open port on your system.

Another option is to find a website that offers full range testing. http://www.hackerwhacker.com is one such site. Make sure that any such site is not just scanning a relatively few well known ports.

Repeat this procedure with every firewall change, every system upgrade or new install, and when any key components of your system changes.

You may also want to enable logging all the denied traffic. At least temporarily. Once the firewall is verified to be doing what you think it should, and if the logs are hopelessly overwhelming, you may want to disable logging.

If relying on portsentry at all, please read the documentation. Depending on your configuration it will either drop the route to the scanner, or implement a ipchains/iptables rule doing the same thing. Also, since it "listens" on the specified ports, all those ports will show as "open". A false alarm in this case.

5.8. Logging

Linux does a lot of logging. Usually to more than one file. It is not always obvious what to make of all these entries -- good, bad or indifferent? Firewall logs tend to generate a fair amount of each. Of course, you are wanting to stop only the "bad", but you will undoubtedly catch some harmless traffic as well. The 'net has a lot of background noise.

In many cases, knowing the intentions of an incoming packet are almost impossible. Attempted intrusion? Misbehaved protocol? Mis-typed IP address? Conclusions can be drawn based on factors such as destination port, source port, protocol, and many other variables. But there is no substitute for experience in interpreting firewall logs. It is a black art in many cases.

So do we really need to log? And how much should we be trying to log? Logging is good in that it tells us that the firewall is functional. Even if we don't understand much of it, we know it is doing "something". And if we have to, we can dig into those logs and find whatever data might be called for.

On the other hand, logging can be bad if it is so excessive, it is difficult to find pertinent data, or worse, fills up a partition. Or if we over re-act and take every last entry as an all out assault. Some perspective is a great benefit, but something that new users lack almost by definition. Again, once your firewall is verified, and you are perplexed or overwhelmed, home desktop users may want to disable as much logging as possible. Anyone with greater responsibilities should log, and then find ways to extract the pertinent data from the logs by filtering out extraneous information.

Not sure where to look for log data? The two logs to keep an eye on are /var/log/messages and /var/log/secure. There may be other application specific logs, depending on what you have installed, or using. FTP, for instance, logs to /var/log/xfer on Red Hat.

Portsentry and tcpwrappers do a certain amount of logging that is not adjustable. xinetd has logging enhancements that can be turned on. Both ipchains and iptables, on the other hand, are very flexible as to what is logged.

For ipchains the -l option can be added to any rule. iptables uses the -j LOG target, and requires its own, separate rule instead. iptables goes a few steps further and allows customized log entries, and rate limiting. See the man page. Presumably, we are more interested in logging blocked traffic, so we'd confine logging to only our DENY and REJECT rules.

So whether you log, and how much you log, and what you do with the logs, is an individual decision, and probably will require some trial and error so that it is manageable. A few auditing and analytical tools can be quite helpful:

Some tools that will monitor your logs for you and notify you when necessary. These likely will require some configuration, and trial and error, to make the most out of them:

5.9. Where to Start

Let's take a quick look at where to run our firewall scripts from.

Portsentry can be run as an init process, like other system services. It is not so important when this is done. Tcpwrappers will be automatically be invoked by inetd or xinetd, so not to worry there either.

But the packet filtering scripts will have to be started somewhere. And many scripts will have logic that uses the local IP address. This will mean that the script must be started after the interface has come up and been assigned an IP address. Ideally, this should be immediately after the interface is up. So this depends on how you connect to the Internet. Also, for protocols like PPP or DHCP that may be dynamic, and get different IP's on each re-connect, it is best to have the scripts run by the appropriate daemon.

Red Hat uses /etc/ppp/ip-up.local for any user defined, local PPP configuration. If this file does not exist, create it, and make it executable (chmod +x). Then with your text editor, add a reference to your firewall script.

For DHCP, it depends on which client. dhcpcd will execute /etc/dhcpcd/dhcpcd-<interface>.exe (e.g. dhcpcd-eth0.exe) whenever a lease is obtained or renewed. So this is where to put a reference to your firewall script. For pump (the default on Red Hat), the main configuration file is /etc/pump.conf. Pump will run whatever script is defined by the "script" statement any time there is a new or renewed lease: 


 script /usr/local/bin/ipchains.sh

If you have a static IP address (i.e. it never changes), the placement is not so important and should be before the interface comes up!

5.10. Summary and Conclusions for Step 3

In this section we looked at various components that might be used to construct a "firewall". And learned that a firewall is as much a strategy and combination of components, as it is any one particular application or component. We looked at a few of the most commonly available applications that can be found on most, if not all, Linux systems. This is not a definitive list.

This is a lot of information to digest at all at one time and expect anyone to understand it all. Hopefully this can used as a starting point, and used for future reference as well. The packet filter firewall examples can be used as starting points as well. Just use your text editor, cut and paste into a file with an appropriate name, and then run chmod +x against it to make it executable. Some minor editing of the variables may be necessary. Also look at the Links section for sites and utilities that can be used to generate a custom script. This may be a little less daunting.

Now we are done with Steps 1, 2 and 3. Hopefully by now you have already instituted some basic measures to protect your system(s) from the various and sundry threats that lurk on networks. If you haven't implemented any of the above steps yet, now is a good time to take a break, go back to the top, and have at it. The most important steps are the ones above.

A few quick conclusions...

"What is best iptables, ipchains, tcpwrappers, or portsentry?" The quick answer is that iptables can do more than any of the others. So if you are using a 2.4 kernel, use iptables. Then, ipchains if using a 2.2 kernel. The long answer is "it just depends on what you are doing and what the objective is". Sorry. The other tools all have some merit in any given situation, and all can be effective in the right situation.

"Do I really need all these packages?" No, but please combine more than one approach, and please follow all the above recommendations. iptables by itself is good, but in conjunction with some of the other approaches, we are even stronger. Do not rely on any single mechanism to provide a security blanket. "Layers" of protection is always best. As is sound administrative practices. The best iptables script in the world is but one piece of the puzzle, and should not be used to hide other system weaknesses.

"If I have a small home LAN, do I need to have a firewall on each computer?" No, not necessary as long as the LAN gateway has a properly configured firewall. Unwanted traffic should be stopped at that point. And as long as this is working as intended, there should be no unwanted traffic on the LAN. But, by the same token, doing this certainly does no harm. And on larger LANs that might be mixed platform, or with untrusted users, it would be advisable.

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Step 2: Updating Intrusion Detection