Tcpcrypt has 2 separate Linux implementations: kernel and userland. These instructions cover only the userland tcpcrypt, which is easier to set up.
- OpenSSL >= 0.9.8
- libnfnetlink >= 0.0.40
- libnetfilter_queue >= 0.0.16
- libcap
- Kernel divert socket support (NFQUEUE)
apt-get install iptables libcap-dev libssl-dev \
libnfnetlink-dev libnetfilter-queue-dev
Installing your distribution's libnfnetfilter_queue package most likely handles
this for you. If not, then you need to enable the following in make menuconfig:
- Networking -> Networking options -> Network packet filtering framework (Netfilter) and the following suboptions
- Core Netfilter Configuration -> Netfilter NFQUEUE over NFNETLINK interface
- Core Netfilter Configuration -> Netfilter Xtables support -> "NFQUEUE" target Support
The .config options for these are:
CONFIG_NETFILTER_NETLINK
CONFIG_NETFILTER_NETLINK_QUEUE
CONFIG_NETFILTER_XT_TARGET_NFQUEUE
Run:
cd tcpcrypt/user
./configure
make
Optional: running make install will install libtcpcrypt and tcpcrypt
headers, for building apps that use tcpcrypt's session ID.
See the included README.markdown file for ways to try out tcpcrypt.
Tcpcrypt is incompatible with ECN (explicit congestion notification, RFC 3168). To disable ECN (if you know what you're doing), run sudo sysctl net.ipv4.tcp_ecn=0. Reported by jech at #7.
The included launch_tcpcryptd.sh script adds iptable rules to divert Web and
local port 7777 traffic to tcpcryptd. Read on only for more complex firewall
setups.
The naive way to use tcpcryptd:
iptables -A OUTPUT -p tcp -j NFQUEUE --queue-num 666
iptables -A INPUT -p tcp -j NFQUEUE --queue-num 666
This will apply tcpcrypt to all locally destined (or generated) TCP packets. This will work, but you'll run into problems #1 and #2, which may not be problems if you don't have a firewall or nat setup.
For testing on your local machine, you can restrict tcpcrypt to the loopback interface:
iptables -A OUTPUT -p tcp -o lo -j NFQUEUE --queue-num 666
iptables -A INPUT -p tcp -i lo -j NFQUEUE --queue-num 666
Or, to run tcpcrypt only on port 80, use this (taken from launch_tcpcryptd.sh):
iptables -A OUTPUT -p tcp -m tcp --dport 80 -j NFQUEUE --queue-num 666
iptables -A INPUT -p tcp -m tcp --sport 80 -j NFQUEUE --queue-num 666
To restore your iptables rules to their previous state, you can remove rules by
replacing -A (append) with -D (delete) in the above commands.
The following instructions apply to using tcpcrypt on firewall/gateway boxes.
Linux firewall setup is more challenging than on FreeBSD for two reasons.
-
In FreeBSD, after a packet is diverted, the divert daemon can drop the packet, or accept it. In the latter case, firewall processing continues from the next rule. So basically natd will get a chance to run, and other firewall rules. It's a pipeline. On Linux, you can either accept or drop the packet, which ignores the rest of the firewall.
-
In FreeBSD, you can easily order tcpcryptd, then natd, because they're both in userland, and both use divert, and the whole firewall is a pipeline. On Linux natd is IP connection tracking in the kernel, which is used for stateful firewalls too. We gotta make tcpcryptd run BEFORE conntrack.
To make tcpcrypt work the "proper" way, making sure that nat and stateful firewalls (e.g., -m state --state ESTABLISHED) work:
iptables -t raw -A PREROUTING -p tcp -j NFQUEUE --queue-num 666
iptables -t mangle -A POSTROUTING -p tcp -j NFQUEUE --queue-num 666
This will apply tcpcrypt to all TCP packets entering and exiting the box, including forwarded packets. Note that this setup will respect firewall rules in other tables but terminate those in the raw and mangle tables. In short, your firewall rules in the filter table and nat table (those that you probably care about most) will work. You'll get caught by problem #1 though.
To make tcpcrypt work the elite way, making sure that all firewall rules are obeyed and conntrack isn't confused:
iptables -t raw -N tcpcrypt
iptables -t raw -A tcpcrypt -p tcp -m mark --mark 0x0/0x10 -j NFQUEUE --queue-num 666
iptables -t raw -I PREROUTING -j tcpcrypt
iptables -t mangle -N tcpcrypt
iptables -t mangle -A tcpcrypt -p tcp -m mark --mark 0x0/0x10 -j NFQUEUE --queue-num 666
iptables -t mangle -I POSTROUTING -j tcpcrypt
And launch tcpcryptd with -x 0x10
This example is like before, but will create a chain with only the tcpcrypt rule, which will run only if a packet is unmarked. When tcpcryptd needs to accept a packet, rather than passing a verdict of ACCEPT, which terminates all rule processing, it will pass a verdict of REPEAT, which restarts processing at the current chain. To avoid loops, it will also mark the packet so that the rule to divert will be matched only once. Effectively the first time round real work will be done, and the second time round we "return" to process the other rules.
Note that you can make tcpcryptd work transparently on forwarded traffic, and even in conjunction with NAT. You can pretend that the Internet is tcpcrypted. Lets say eth0 is your LAN. You can do something like:
[create the tcpcrypt chains as explained earlier.]
iptables -t raw -A PREROUTING -i eth0 -j tcpcrypt
iptables -t mangle -A POSTROUTING -o eth0 -j tcpcrypt
tcpcryptd will see all incoming traffic from eth0 and make it look like standard TCP to the outside world, and will then tcpcrypt all the responses coming back to eth0. There's one caveat though when using it in conjunction with NAT (conntrack). tcpcryptd forges a packet (the INIT2) and this confuses conntrack as it thinks it's a new connection and it changes the source port. You therefore need to add:
iptables -t raw -A OUTPUT -o eth0 -j NOTRACK
i.e., all locally generated traffic (the forged packet from tcpcryptd) should not be natted. In fact I don't even know why it is being natted (maybe a bug). Of course you need to setup nat with something like:
iptables -t nat -A POSTROUTING -o eth1 -j SNAT --to-source 1.2.3.4
where eth1 is your Internet interface and 1.2.3.4 your Internet static IP.