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    Unable to Access WebConfigurator UI and Unable to SSH into pfsense

    Scheduled Pinned Locked Moved General pfSense Questions
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    • johnpozJ
      johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator @dougs
      last edited by

      @dougs yeah pfblocker loves to do that - I keep meaning to look into a way to stop it, or change how often it does it.. Part of the reason I changed my number to 100 hehehe

      I would consider an update to items in a list or alias to be a config change.. That it makes constant changes to your config backup could be problematic for sure, especially when they happen often.. If it was once a day, or only when you actually interacted with the config via the pfblocker gui, etc.

      If you have the antilock out rule enabled, it should be impossible for pfblocker to create a rule that would lock you out.

      An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
      If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
      Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
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      • D
        dougs
        last edited by

        There's an anti-lockout rule in place so I shouldn't be locked out. However, I am!

        I haven't made any changes to pfblockerNG in days.

        It looks like I might need to do a reset to defaults and restore from a backup, yes? I'm fine with doing that as long there isn't any other easier way of remedying this! I just have to work around my wife! She thinks everything is fine as long as she has a working Internet connection! :)

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        • stephenw10S
          stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
          last edited by

          Yup the anti-lockout rule should apply before anything pfBlocker does if it's present.

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          • D
            dougs
            last edited by

            How can I verify if the anti-lock out rule is in effect or not from the console?

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            • D
              dougs
              last edited by dougs

              I'm reviewing this page: https://docs.netgate.com/pfsense/en/latest/troubleshooting/locked-out.html

              If I enable WAN access to the firewall as follows: #pfSsh.php playback enableallowallwan, would this still require that one authenticate in order to access the Web GUI? I don't want to open the door to the whole wide world if such authentication isn't needed!

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              • S
                SteveITS Galactic Empire @dougs
                last edited by

                @dougs Yes it still needs the password.

                To be clear the anti lockout rule is a firewall rule...it controls whether the client can connect to the web server or not, not whether one can log in. If you see an SSH prompt or web page then the firewall isn't blocking you.

                Pre-2.7.2/23.09: Only install packages for your version, or risk breaking it. Select your branch in System/Update/Update Settings.
                When upgrading, allow 10-15 minutes to restart, or more depending on packages and device speed.
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                • stephenw10S
                  stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
                  last edited by

                  Yes you still have to authenticate but doing that adds pass rules on the WAN which you probably don't want as you say.

                  Try running: pfctl -vvsr | grep -A 4 anti
                  That will show you if the antilock rules are present and if they are opening states and passing packets.

                  You can add a pass rule to LAN using easyrule if you have to.
                  https://docs.netgate.com/pfsense/en/latest/firewall/easyrule.html

                  Do you use policy routing at all? With gateways set on the rules? That can end up bypassing the firewall itself.

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                  • D
                    dougs
                    last edited by

                    Running "pfctl -vvsr | grep -A 4 anti" gave me this: https://imgur.com/a/fgXHIEx Looks like the anti-lock out rule is in effect, yes?

                    I tried:

                    #easyrule pass lan tcp <my computer IP addr> <firewall LAN addr> 443
                    

                    Didn't work for both Web GUI and ssh . Is this easyrule only for WAN addresses?

                    I'm not familiar with policy routing so I would imagine it's not being used here.

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                    • johnpozJ
                      johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator @dougs
                      last edited by

                      @dougs said in Unable to Access WebConfigurator UI and Unable to SSH into pfsense:

                      I'm not familiar with policy routing so I would imagine it's not being used here.

                      Did you have rules with a gateway selected, or is the gateway just an *

                      An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
                      If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
                      Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
                      SG-4860 24.11 | Lab VMs 2.8, 24.11

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                      • D
                        dougs
                        last edited by

                        Not sure. I might have had an alias pointing to the firewall and used that in some rules instead of an asterisk. We use only one ISP so one gateway.

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                        • S
                          SteveITS Galactic Empire @dougs
                          last edited by

                          @dougs said in Unable to Access WebConfigurator UI and Unable to SSH into pfsense:

                          The reason for each of the 7 most recent backups that I could see on the screen is "pfblockerNG: saving Unbound custom options". This leads me to suspect there might be something wonky going on with pfblockerNG

                          Pretty sure it saves a new config every time an update runs. (I would think, because it's regenerating rules)

                          Pre-2.7.2/23.09: Only install packages for your version, or risk breaking it. Select your branch in System/Update/Update Settings.
                          When upgrading, allow 10-15 minutes to restart, or more depending on packages and device speed.
                          Upvote 👍 helpful posts!

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                          • johnpozJ
                            johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator @dougs
                            last edited by

                            @dougs said in Unable to Access WebConfigurator UI and Unable to SSH into pfsense:

                            We use only one ISP so one gateway.

                            Talking about your lan side rules, do you have say your wan_dhcp selected?

                            example..

                            policyroute.jpg

                            See where the gateway is called out - that would be policy routing.

                            An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
                            If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
                            Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
                            SG-4860 24.11 | Lab VMs 2.8, 24.11

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                            • D
                              dougs
                              last edited by

                              I don't believe we manipulate the gateway address in that fashion.

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                              • johnpozJ
                                johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator @dougs
                                last edited by

                                @dougs said in Unable to Access WebConfigurator UI and Unable to SSH into pfsense:

                                I don't believe

                                Prob behoove you to double check, you never know what gets set sometime - I agree normally you wouldn't have this set unless you had a specific reason. But you would be surprised how many posts end up being they are doing PBR is the cause they can't get some other vlan, etc.

                                And even if you were doing it, it shouldn't prevent access with antilock which would be evaluated first.

                                An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
                                If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
                                Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
                                SG-4860 24.11 | Lab VMs 2.8, 24.11

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                                • stephenw10S
                                  stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
                                  last edited by

                                  @dougs said in Unable to Access WebConfigurator UI and Unable to SSH into pfsense:

                                  https://imgur.com/a/fgXHIEx

                                  Yes that shows the anti-lockout rules are present on LAN. But also that they have passed nothing; 0 bytes/packets/states.

                                  So either some other rule is passing them. Somehow. Or maybe the traffic never reaches pfSense. Or perhaps it's being forwarded.

                                  You could try running a tcpdump from the CLI while you try to connect to confirm it's at least trying.

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                                  • johnpozJ
                                    johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator @stephenw10
                                    last edited by

                                    @stephenw10 said in Unable to Access WebConfigurator UI and Unable to SSH into pfsense:

                                    CLI while you try to connect to confirm it's at least trying

                                    could be sending it to something else.. sniff is yeah what I would do - have access to console, sniff on pfsense itself to validate traffic gets there.

                                    An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
                                    If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
                                    Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
                                    SG-4860 24.11 | Lab VMs 2.8, 24.11

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                                    • D
                                      dougs
                                      last edited by

                                      About a week ago, I decided to reset the pfSense firewall to factory defaults from the console menu and left it running without changing any configuration options aside from setting the WAN/LAN interfaces, modifying the console dashboard and creating a DHCP server IP address range. Everything else was left as is.

                                      I was able to access the Web GUI for a couple days. Just 2 days ago, I discovered I could not access it nor could I ssh into it!

                                      Restarting the Web Configurator does not allow me to access the firewall web site.

                                      Executing pfctl -vvsr | grep -A 4 anti shows this:
                                      PXL_20240114_163414107_2024-01-14_08-40-18.jpg
                                      https://imgur.com/a/J2mbVCx

                                      Tried running: #easyrule pass lan tcp <my computer IP addr> <firewall LAN addr> 443 and it states the rule was successfully created. However, I cannot access the LAN address of the firewall nor could I ping it from the computer IP address. Tried it from another computer with similar results.

                                      Did a zpool scrub pfSense and did not indicate any errors.

                                      Every system on the LAN side can access the Internet normally-- including our Samsung TV sets and an Enphase IoT device among others.

                                      This is on an older Protectli FW6C purchased in 2021. https://protectli.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/FW6C-Datasheet-190104.pdf

                                      At this point, I am not sure what else to do aside from reformatting the drive and starting all over again. Please advise.

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                                      • johnpozJ
                                        johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator @dougs
                                        last edited by

                                        @dougs and no simple tcpdump?

                                        You could have no rules and completely wide open, still never works if your traffic never gets there..

                                        Your anti lock rule is there.. don't show any states.. Do a simple tcpdump when you try and get there..

                                        An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
                                        If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
                                        Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
                                        SG-4860 24.11 | Lab VMs 2.8, 24.11

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                                        • stephenw10S
                                          stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
                                          last edited by

                                          Mmm, that sure starts to look like it's just not hitting pfSense at all.

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                                          • NollipfSenseN
                                            NollipfSense @stephenw10
                                            last edited by

                                            @stephenw10 said in Unable to Access WebConfigurator UI and Unable to SSH into pfsense:

                                            Mmm, that sure starts to look like it's just not hitting pfSense at all.

                                            Yes, sounds like possibly a bad cable...

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