Securing Your SSH Server

Keeping your data secure is critically important. Aspera strongly recommends taking additional steps to set up and configure your SSH server to protect against common attacks. These steps include the following:

Changing the TCP port.
Restricting user access.

Changing and Securing the TCP Port

Generally, SSH servers listen for incoming connections on TCP Port 22. As such, Port 22 is subject to countless, unauthorized login attempts by hackers who are attempting to access unsecured servers. An effective deterrent is simply to turn off Port 22 and run the service on a seemingly random port above 1024 (and up to 65535). To standardize the port for use in Aspera transfers, Aspera recommends setting the TCP port to 33001.

The OpenSSH suite included in the installer uses TCP/22 as the default port for SSH connections. Remote Aspera clients attempt to establish an SSH connection with the server on port 33001. However, if the connection fails, the client retries the connection on port 22. Aspera recommends opening TCP/33001 and disabling TCP/22 to prevent security breaches of your SSH server.

Open TCP/33001 and keep TCP/22 open until users are notified they should switch to TCP/33001.
Once users are notified, block TCP/22 and allow traffic only on TCP/33001.

Prerequisites:

Before changing the default port for SSH connections, verify with your network administrators that TCP/33001 is open.
Before closing port TCP/22, notify users of the change.

Aspera recognizes that disabling the default SSH connection port (TCP/22) may affect your client users. When you change the port, ensure that you advise your users on how to configure the new port number, from the GUI (if available and used) and from the command line.

GUI: To change the SSH port in Desktop Client, click Connections and select the entry for the server whose ports are changing. On the Connection tab, click Show Advanced Settings and enter the SSH port number in the SSH Port (TCP) field.

Command line: Clients running FASP transfers from the command line can specify the port by using the -P 33001 option.

The following steps require root privileges.

Open the SSH configuration file.
```
/etc/ssh/sshd_config
```
Add the TCP/33001 SSH port.
SSHD can listen on multiple ports, so you can have both TCP/33001 and TCP/22 open. To enable TCP/33001, add the port to your sshd_config file, as in the following example:
```
Port 22 
Port 33001
```
Once your client users have been notified of the port change to TCP/33001, disable TCP/22 and use only TCP/33001 by commenting out "Port 22" in your sshd_config file. For example:
```
#Port 22
Port 33001 
```
Disable non-admin SSH tunneling.
These instructions require that OpenSSH 4.4 or newer is installed on your system in order to use the Match directive. Match allows you to selectively override certain configuration options when specific criteria (based on user, group, hostname, or address) are met.
Open your SSH Server configuration file, sshd_config, with a text editor. Add the following lines to the end of the file (or modify them if they already exist):
```
AllowTcpForwarding no
Match Group root 
AllowTcpForwarding yes
```
Depending on your sshd_config file, you might have additional instances of AllowTCPForwarding that are set to the default Yes. Review your sshd_config file for other instances and disable if necessary.

Disabling TCP forwarding does not improve security unless users are also denied shell access, because they can still install their own forwarders. Review your user and file permissions, and see the steps below for instructions on modifying user shell access.
Update authentication methods
Public key authentication can prevent brute-force SSH attacks if all password-based authentication methods are disabled. For this reason, Aspera recommends disabling password authentication in the sshd_config file and enabling private/public key authentication. To do so, add or uncomment PubkeyAuthentication yes and comment out PasswordAuthentication yes.
```
PubkeyAuthentication yes
#PasswordAuthentication yes
PasswordAuthentication no 
```
Note: If you choose to leave password authentication enabled, be sure to advise account creators to use strong passwords and set PermitEmptyPasswords to "no".
```
PermitEmptyPasswords no
```
Disable root login.
By default, OpenSSH allows root logins. However, disabling root access helps maintain a more secure server. Aspera recommends disabling root access by commenting out PermitRootLogin yes in the sshd_config file and adding PermitRootLogin No.
```
#PermitRootLogin yes 
PermitRootLogin no
```
Administrators can use the su command when root privileges are necessary.

Restart the SSH server to apply new settings.

To apply your new SSH server configuration settings, you must restart the server. Restarting your SSH server does not affect currently connected users.

To restart or reload your SSH server, run the following commands:

Linux Version	Command
RedHat, zLinux (restart)	$ `sudo service sshd restart`
RedHat, zLinux (reload)	$ `sudo service sshd reload`
Debian (restart)	$ `sudo /etc/init.d/ssh restart`
Debian (reload)	$ `sudo /etc/init.d/ssh reload`

Review your logs periodically for attacks.
You can view the state of active TCP connections by running the netstat command:
```
# netstat -an -p tcp
```
Typical output shows multiple, different IP addresses connected to specific ports:
```
  TCP    10.0.111.200:53402     72.21.81.109:80        CLOSE_WAIT
  TCP    10.0.111.200:53865     173.194.202.188:5228   ESTABLISHED
  TCP    10.0.111.200:53876     10.0.9.16:445          TIME_WAIT
  TCP    10.0.111.200:55164     208.85.40.20:443       ESTABLISHED
  TCP    10.0.111.200:55335     207.200.35.240:443     ESTABLISHED
  TCP    10.0.111.200:55444     67.199.110.81:443      ESTABLISHED
  TCP    10.0.111.200:56278     104.24.11.90:443       ESTABLISHED
```
If your server is under attack, you might see output similar to the following, in which the same IP address attempts to connect to contiguous ports (hundreds or thousands of times) and the connection is timing out (reporting a status of TIME_WAIT):
```
  TCP    10.0.111.200:53402     72.21.81.109:60974      TIME_WAIT
  TCP    10.0.111.200:53865     72.21.81.109:60975      TIME_WAIT
  TCP    10.0.111.200:53876     72.21.81.109:60976      TIME_WAIT
  TCP    10.0.111.200:55164     72.21.81.109:60977      TIME_WAIT
  TCP    10.0.111.200:55335     72.21.81.109:60978      TIME_WAIT
  TCP    10.0.111.200:55444     72.21.81.109:60979      TIME_WAIT
  TCP    10.0.111.200:56278     72.21.81.109:60980      TIME_WAIT
```
If you see this, review your logs to determine the source and cause.

Open your syslog, which is located in /var/log/auth.log or /var/log/secure, depending on your system configuration.

Look for invalid users in the log, especially a series of login attempts with common user names from the same address, usually in alphabetical order. For example:
```
...
Mar 10 18:48:02 sku sshd[1496]: Failed password for invalid user alex from 1.2.3.4 port 1585 ssh2
...
Mar 14 23:25:52 sku sshd[1496]: Failed password for invalid user alice from 1.2.3.4 port 1585 ssh2
...
```
If you identify attacks, take the following steps:
- Double-check the SSH security settings in this topic.
- Report attackers to your ISP's email address for abuse reports (often abuse@your_isp.com).

Restricting User Access

Restricting user access is a critical component of securing your server. By default, all user accounts are allowed to browse and read all files on the server. To limit a user's access to a portion of the system, set the account's shell to the Aspera secured shell (aspshell) and create a document root (docroot) for that user. The aspshell permits only the following operations:

Run Aspera uploads and downloads to or from this computer.
Establish connections in the application.
Browse, list, rename, create, or delete contents.

Restrict user permissions with aspshell.
By default, all system users can establish a FASP connection and are only restricted by file permissions. You can restrict the user's file operations through the aspshell, which permits only the following operations:
- Running Aspera uploads and downloads to or from this computer.
- Establishing connections in the application.
- Browsing, listing, creating, renaming, or deleting contents.
These instructions explain one way to change a user account so that it uses the aspshell; there may be other ways to do so on your system.

Open the following file with a text editor:
```
/etc/passwd
```
Add or replace the user's shell with aspshell. For example, to apply aspshell to the user aspera_user_1, use the following settings in this file:
```
...
aspera_user_1:x:501:501:...:/home/aspera_user_1:/bin/aspshell
...
```
Set a user's docroot and restrict read, write, and browse privileges.
When a user's docroot is empty (blank), that user has full access to your server's directories and files. To restrict the user, you must set a non-empty docroot.
Run the following command to set a docroot for a specific user:
```
#asconfigurator -x "set_user_data;user_name,username;absolute,docroot"
```
You can further restrict access by disabling write privileges:
```
#asconfigurator -x "set_user_data;user_name,username;write_allowed,false"
```
Run the asp-check tool to check for potential user-security issues.
The asp-check tool performs the following secure checks:
- Identifies full-access users and reports how many exist on the system. The existence of full-access users does not necessarily indicate that your system is vulnerable. However, the system administrator must ensure that the existence of full-access users is intentional.
- Identifies restricted users and potential misconfigurations, including: incorrect login shell (one that is not restricted via aspshell), SSH tunnel access (which can be used to work around the restricted shell), and docroot settings that allow users to access the home directory.
  Note: A docroot setting that allows access to the home directory is not necessarily a security risk. However, a user with this docroot can download or upload SSH keys and upload .login scripts, which could be used to circumvent other access restrictions. Aspera highly recommends setting the docroot under a user's home directory (such as /home/jane/data) or in an alternate location (for example, /data).
To run the asp-check tool, run the following command:
```
# sudo /opt/aspera/bin/asp-check.sh
```
Search results are displayed as in the following example. If potential issues are identified, review your users' settings before proceeding.
```
Users with full access: 22 (not considered insecure)
Restricted users: 0
Insecure users: 0
 - no restricted shell (aspshell): 0
 - docroot above home directory: 0
 - ssh tunneling enabled: 0
```

Parent topic: Enterprise Server Configuration and Transfer Reference