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    Packets go through, logging is set, but no logs of the traffic

    Scheduled Pinned Locked Moved General pfSense Questions
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    • stephenw10S Offline
      stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
      last edited by

      It will only log when a new state is opened. An OpenVPN connection like that could be open for months so it's possible any states you see were created before you enabled logging?

      S 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
      • GertjanG Offline
        Gertjan @silviub
        last edited by

        @silviub said in Packets go through, logging is set, but no logs of the traffic:

        What's going on ?!

        You were close 😊

        Added to what stephenw10 said, go here : Diagnostics > States > States and check the "State Table" box.
        Then go for the orange Reset button.
        A side effect exists : you also 'kill' your connection the the GUI.
        You'll actually kill the connection for everybody ^^

        No "help me" PM's please. Use the forum, the community will thank you.
        Edit : and where are the logs ??

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        • S Offline
          silviub @stephenw10
          last edited by

          @stephenw10
          I appreciate the reply, but there isn't really any client here. It's just me, running nc -u <ip> 1194 and sending some data, therefore the connections are always "new".
          @Gertjan as I said, this is not really (yet) alive, because I'm just testing stuff out. But I had clients connect and disconnect and I didn't see them in the logs, so I started to manually test.

          Any way to log ALL connections, not just new connections? Maybe....?
          Any other ideas?

          chpalmerC 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
          • stephenw10S Offline
            stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
            last edited by

            Ok, so to confirm you see states and packets on the rule as shown in the gui?

            Try reloading the ruleset in Status > Filter Reload and make sure it loads cleanly without errors.

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            • S Offline
              silviub @stephenw10
              last edited by

              @stephenw10 Yes, I can see the states and packets next to the rule.
              The firewall loads with no issues, just did it.

              Nothing changed.

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              • stephenw10S Offline
                stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
                last edited by

                Hmm, OK. Check the actual ruleset in /tmp/rules.debug. Do you see your custom rule? Does it have 'log' set?

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                • S Offline
                  silviub @stephenw10
                  last edited by

                  @stephenw10
                  pass in log quick on $WAN reply-to ( vtnet0 a.b.c.d ) inet proto udp from any to 10.151.0.5 port 1194 ridentifier 1702983321 keep state label "USER_RULE: OpenVPN" label "id:1702983321"

                  Yes, it seems to have the log stanza (pass in log quick).

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                  • chpalmerC Offline
                    chpalmer @silviub
                    last edited by

                    @silviub said in Packets go through, logging is set, but no logs of the traffic:

                    but there isn't really any client here

                    Just a refresher coarse.. client device requests... server listens and grants. rinse and repeat.

                    Very basic.. Cant have a connection between two computers without that.

                    Carry on.

                    Triggering snowflakes one by one..
                    Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-4590T CPU @ 2.00GHz on an M400 WG box.

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                    • S Offline
                      silviub @chpalmer
                      last edited by

                      @chpalmer while you're technically right, I was replying to stephenw10, who said

                      An OpenVPN connection like that could be open for months so it's possible any states you see were created before you enabled logging?

                      So, in that regard, there wasn't a VPN client that kept the connections open. Please read above.

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                      • stephenw10S Offline
                        stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
                        last edited by

                        Is the firewall logging anything? If you create some other rule as a test with logging does it work as expected?

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                        • S Offline
                          silviub @stephenw10
                          last edited by silviub

                          @stephenw10 Yes, it does. And weirdly enough, some packets in this rule are logged, while others are not. I tried from two different public IPs to nc -u <IP> <port> and one got logged, one didn't, even though in States I see both of them.... What's going on?! :D

                          P.S. It can't match a different rule - one that is not logging let's say - because ALL my rules are set to log. So no matter what rule it'd match, I'd have to see it in the logs.

                          When I opened this forum post I tried to reach the machine from a certain public IP. That was on the 17th of October. I can still see that log line. If I open a new connection (different source port, naturally), the traffic is forwarded properly, the traffic reaches the target machine, but I don't see the connection in the logs, even though I see it in the states.

                          P.S. could it be an issue that the target machine doesn't reply? Since this is UDP, I get no reply from the target....?

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                          • stephenw10S Offline
                            stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
                            last edited by

                            Hmm, I mean matching some other unexpected rule is about the only thing I could imagine doing this. It could be something dynamic perhaps.

                            If you check states created by the traffic using pfctl -vss and grep-ing for something do you see the expected rule number? The same rule number on very state?

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                            • S Offline
                              silviub @stephenw10
                              last edited by

                              @stephenw10

                              # pfctl -vss | grep x.y.z.xx
                              all udp 10.151.0.5:1194 (a.b.c.d:1194) <- x.y.z.xx:56223       NO_TRAFFIC:SINGLE
                              vtnet2.305 udp x.y.z.xx:56223 -> 10.151.0.5:1194       SINGLE:NO_TRAFFIC
                              

                              I don't see a rule number anywhere.

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