Iptables Fundamentals 120618102819 Phpapp02 PDF

Linux Firewall Tutorial: IPTables Tables, Chains, Rules Fundamentals
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by Ramesh Natarajan on January 24, 2011
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Stum iptables firewall is used to manage packet filtering and NAT rules. IPTables comes with all Linux distributions. Understanding how to setup and configure iptables will help you manage your Linux firewall effectively.
http://www.thegeekstuff.com/2011/01/iptables-fundamentals/
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iptables tool is used to manage the Linux firewall rules. At a first look, iptables might look complex (or even confusing). But, once you understand the basics of how iptables work and how it is structured, reading and writing iptables firewall rules will be easy. This article is part of an ongoing iptables tutorial series. This is the 1st article in that series. This article explains how iptables is structured, and explains the fundamentals about iptables tables, chains and rules. On a high-level iptables might contain multiple tables. Tables might contain multiple chains. Chains can be built-in or user-defined. Chains might contain multiple rules. Rules are defined for the packets. So, the structure is: iptables -> Tables -> Chains -> Rules. This is defined in the following diagram.
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Fig: IPTables Table, Chain, and Rule Structure Just to re-iterate, tables are bunch of chains, and chains are bunch of firewall rules.
I. IPTABLES TABLES and CHAINS

IPTables has the following 4 built-in tables.
1. Filter Table
Filter is default table for iptables. So, if you dont define you own table, youll be using filter table. Iptabless filter table has the following built-in chains. INPUT chain Incoming to firewall. For packets coming to the local server.
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OUTPUT chain Outgoing from firewall. For packets generated locally and going out of the local server. FORWARD chain Packet for another NIC on the local server. For packets routed through the local server.
2. NAT table
Iptables NAT table has the following built-in chains. PREROUTING chain Alters packets before routing. i.e Packet translation happens immediately after the packet comes to the system (and before routing). This helps to translate the destination ip address of the packets to something that matches the routing on the local server. This is used for DNAT (destination NAT). POSTROUTING chain Alters packets after routing. i.e Packet translation happens when the packets are leaving the system. This helps to translate the source ip address of the packets to something that might match the routing on the desintation server. This is used for SNAT (source NAT). OUTPUT chain NAT for locally generated packets on the firewall.
3. Mangle table
Iptabless Mangle table is for specialized packet alteration. This alters QOS bits in the TCP header. Mangle table has the following built-in chains. PREROUTING chain OUTPUT chain FORWARD chain INPUT chain POSTROUTING chain
4. Raw table
Iptables Raw table is for configuration excemptions. Raw table has the following built-in chains. PREROUTING chain OUTPUT chain The following diagram shows the three important tables in iptables.
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Fig: IPTables built-in tables
II. IPTABLES RULES

Following are the key points to remember for the iptables rules. Rules contain a criteria and a target. If the criteria is matched, it goes to the rules specified in the target (or) executes the special values mentioned in the target. If the criteria is not matached, it moves on to the next rule.
Target Values
Following are the possible special values that you can specify in the target. ACCEPT Firewall will accept the packet. DROP Firewall will drop the packet. QUEUE Firewall will pass the packet to the userspace. RETURN Firewall will stop executing the next set of rules in the current chain for this packet. The control will be returned to the calling chain.
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If you do iptables list (or) service iptables status, youll see all the available firewall rules on your system. The following iptable example shows that there are no firewall rules defined on this system. As you see, it displays the default input table, with the default input chain, forward chain, and output chain.
# iptables -t filter --list Chain INPUT (policy ACCEPT) target prot opt source Chain FORWARD (policy ACCEPT) target prot opt source Chain OUTPUT (policy ACCEPT) target prot opt source
destination
destination
destination
Do the following to view the mangle table.

# iptables -t mangle --list
Do the following to view the nat table.

# iptables -t nat --list
Do the following to view the raw table.

# iptables -t raw --list
Note: If you dont specify the -t option, it will display the default filter table. So, both of the following commands are the same.
# iptables -t filter --list (or) # iptables --list
The following iptable example shows that there are some rules defined in the input, forward, and output chain of the filter table.
# iptables --list Chain INPUT (policy ACCEPT) num target prot opt source 1 RH-Firewall-1-INPUT all -Chain FORWARD (policy ACCEPT) num target prot opt source 1 RH-Firewall-1-INPUT all --
0.0.0.0/0
destination 0.0.0.0/0
0.0.0.0/0
destination 0.0.0.0/0
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Chain OUTPUT (policy ACCEPT) num target prot opt source Chain RH-Firewall-1-INPUT (2 references) num target prot opt source 1 ACCEPT all -- 0.0.0.0/0 2 ACCEPT icmp -- 0.0.0.0/0 3 ACCEPT esp -- 0.0.0.0/0 4 ACCEPT ah -- 0.0.0.0/0 5 ACCEPT udp -- 0.0.0.0/0 6 ACCEPT udp -- 0.0.0.0/0 7 ACCEPT tcp -- 0.0.0.0/0 8 ACCEPT all -- 0.0.0.0/0 9 ACCEPT tcp -- 0.0.0.0/0 10 REJECT all -- 0.0.0.0/0
destination
destination 0.0.0.0/0 0.0.0.0/0 0.0.0.0/0 0.0.0.0/0 224.0.0.251 0.0.0.0/0 0.0.0.0/0 0.0.0.0/0 0.0.0.0/0 0.0.0.0/0
icmp type 255
udp dpt:5353 udp dpt:631 tcp dpt:631 state RELATED,ESTABLISHED state NEW tcp dpt:22 reject-with icmp-host-prohibited
The rules in the iptables list command output contains the following fields: num Rule number within the particular chain target Special target variable that we discussed above prot Protocols. tcp, udp, icmp, etc., opt Special options for that specific rule. source Source ip-address of the packet destination Destination ip-address for the packet
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Tags: IPTables Tutorials, Ubuntu IPTables Firewall, UNIX IPTables { 18 comments read them below or add one } 1 Pushpraj January 24, 2011 at 12:56 am very good.keep writing Thanks Pushpraj 2 pupu January 24, 2011 at 3:22 am Just note that DNAT and SNAT also stands for Dynamic and Static NAT, so dont be confused when you read another text. Anyway, nice article, thanks! 3 Rendy January 24, 2011 at 3:22 am Thank You Rameshvery clear! 4 vaisakh January 24, 2011 at 3:59 am Excellent .. I was searching for a good article about the fundamentals of IPtable.. Thanks. Also waiting for next part 5 Ben January 24, 2011 at 9:42 am
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Nice article, look forward to rest of the series. Any idea when others will be out? 6 p campbell January 24, 2011 at 10:07 am Some of your articles are excellent for beginners but this is not a tutorial it is misnamed. 7 Waly DIOUF January 24, 2011 at 11:06 am This website is sooooo what I just need at work. Good work Ramesh, youre a genuis. Thanks a lot 8 shakerlxxv January 24, 2011 at 12:49 pm Great topic. Looking forward to the rest of the series. 9 R January 24, 2011 at 1:36 pm Ramesh, You might want to include tutorial on fwbuilder, its a nice gui interface and used to manage firewall on 100s of hosts. -R 10 shaheem January 25, 2011 at 1:21 am great stuff. also waiting for the follow up! 11 artie January 25, 2011 at 2:12 pm great read and informative. look forward to the follow up. 12 shezars January 28, 2011 at 2:28 am very helpfullllllll,,, wait, for your next part. 13 Will Knight January 31, 2011 at 10:07 am Good tutorial, I find iptables complex to understand but you have made it so easy, Thanks. 14 abc February 4, 2011 at 1:51 am
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Very Nice tutorial. Thanks 15 saran February 10, 2011 at 10:00 am great starter to the series plz continue with the tutorial 16 abdul jamal February 18, 2011 at 9:37 am Nice job.I read it and got the concept where is confused.. i have some question and answers ,,u will help me out to be correct. Q1: Rule the matches ssh traffic(tcp,22) arriving through interface eth0. ans. iptables -A INPUT -i eth0 -p tcp dport 22 OR iptables -A INPUT -i eth0 -p tcp sport 22 Q2: Rule that matches traffic to a DNS server (udp,53) from any address in the range 10.0.0.0-10.0.0.255 Ans: iptable -A INPUT -m iprange src-range 10.0.0.0-10.0.0.255 -d 10.19.6.142 (dns server) -p udp dport 53 Q3:Rule that matches traffic from any address in the range 10.0.0.1 to 10.0.0.6,inclusive. Ans. iptable -A INPUT -m iprange src-range 10.0.0.1-10.0.0.6 Q4: Three rules that accept traffic from address 10.0.0.1 through 10.0.0.6, but drops traffic from 10.0.0.0 and 10.0.0.7 , without using any extension matches. Ans: iptable -A INPUT -s 10.0.0.0 -j DROP iptable -A INPUT -s 10.0.0.7 -j DROP iptable -A INPUT -m iprange src-range 10.0.0.1-10.0.0.6 -j ACCEPT thanks for the correct and replying 17 Ishara Fernando July 8, 2011 at 12:38 am Now only I understand the firewall concepts and the Iptable rules Each and every technique of explaining the theories are brilliant Mr.Ramesh Keep it up.. We all Are with YOU 18 OKELLO August 16, 2011 at 2:39 am l think am beginning to understand the iptables, thanks man Leave a Comment
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About The Geek Stuff
My name is Ramesh Natarajan. I will be posting instruction guides, how-to, troubleshooting tips and tricks on Linux, database, hardware, security and web. My focus is to write articles that will either teach you or help you resolve a problem. Read more about Ramesh Natarajan and the blog. Support Us Support this blog by purchasing one of my ebooks. Bash 101 Hacks eBook Sed and Awk 101 Hacks eBook Vim 101 Hacks eBook Nagios Core 3 eBook Contact Us Email Me : Use this Contact Form to get in touch me with your comments, questions or suggestions about this site. You can also simply drop me a line to say hello!. Follow us on Twitter Become a fan on Facebook Copyright 20082011 Ramesh Natarajan. All rights reserved | Terms of Service | Advertise
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Linux Firewall Tutorial: IPTables Tables, Chains, Rules Fundamentals

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Linux Firewall Tutorial: IPTables Tables, Chains, Rules Fundamentals

Linux Firewall Tutorial: IPTables Tables, Chains, Rules Fundamentals

Linux Firewall Tutorial: IPTables Tables, Chains, Rules Fundamentals

I. IPTABLES TABLES and CHAINS

Linux Firewall Tutorial: IPTables Tables, Chains, Rules Fundamentals

Linux Firewall Tutorial: IPTables Tables, Chains, Rules Fundamentals

Fig: IPTables built-in tables

II. IPTABLES RULES

Linux Firewall Tutorial: IPTables Tables, Chains, Rules Fundamentals

Do the following to view the mangle table.

Do the following to view the nat table.

Do the following to view the raw table.

Linux Firewall Tutorial: IPTables Tables, Chains, Rules Fundamentals

icmp type 255

Linux Firewall Tutorial: IPTables Tables, Chains, Rules Fundamentals

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Linux Firewall Tutorial: IPTables Tables, Chains, Rules Fundamentals

Linux Firewall Tutorial: IPTables Tables, Chains, Rules Fundamentals

Linux Firewall Tutorial: IPTables Tables, Chains, Rules Fundamentals

Linux Firewall Tutorial: IPTables Tables, Chains, Rules Fundamentals

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Linux Firewall Tutorial: IPTables Tables, Chains, Rules Fundamentals

Linux Firewall Tutorial: IPTables Tables, Chains, Rules Fundamentals

Linux Firewall Tutorial: IPTables Tables, Chains, Rules Fundamentals

Linux Firewall Tutorial: IPTables Tables, Chains, Rules Fundamentals

Linux Firewall Tutorial: IPTables Tables, Chains, Rules Fundamentals

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Linux Firewall Tutorial: IPTables Tables, Chains, Rules Fundamentals

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