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chivolet's avatar
chivolet
Aspirant
Feb 02, 2021
Solved

Block services not working

  If I go into my RBR50 Orbi router under block services, and select thhe defaults of VPN-IPSEC, VPN-L2TP, VPN-PPTP, IPsec, and then add some addition ones such as tcp/udp ports 1194 that should prevent any VPN from being established but it does not.  Is this a known issue that the option is there but it doesn't work?  I am on version V2.5.2.4

Thanks in advance,


  • chivolet wrote:

    Thanks CrimpOn for attempting to recreate it.  Not sure how you captured the Wan/Lan traffic unless you did it off of a switch.


    Although I have no solution to the problem, at least I can explain how to capture LAN/WAN traffic.

    On the Orbi debug page (http://orbilogin.net/debug.htm) there is a check box to "Enable LAN/WAN packet capture".

    Then, click on "START CAPTURE". Perform whatever tests you want.  Then click on "SAVE DEBUG LOG".

    This will create a file in the PC Download folder called Debug.zip that has all sorts of stuff in it.  The files I want are LAN.pcap and WAN.pcap which can be opened by a lot of networking programs.  I use Wireshark (a) because it's free, and (b) because it has a lot of display filter options.

3 Replies


  • chivolet wrote:

      If I go into my RBR50 Orbi router under block services, and select thhe defaults of VPN-IPSEC, VPN-L2TP, VPN-PPTP, IPsec, and then add some addition ones such as tcp/udp ports 1194 that should prevent any VPN from being established but it does not.  Is this a known issue that the option is there but it doesn't work?  I am on version V2.5.2.4

    Thanks in advance,


    Having no VPN, I performed a block on telnet (port 23). After verifying that my PC could telnet to lord.stabs.org (no idea what it is, but was on a list of "places to telnet"), I set up a block on telnet for my PC.  After 'Adding' the block and clickiing 'Apply', telnet would no longer open a connection. After removing the service block, telnet works again.  I should confess that in the past I have been in a hurry and neglected to click 'Apply' or did not notice that although I set the service block to "Always", it got put back to "Never" and I had basically applied nothing. For me, User Error is a daily occurance.

     

    Conclusion: Blocking VPN may not be as simple as blocking telnet.  What I would do is collect the Orbi WAN/LAN traffic while opening a VPN session and see where it goes and what ports are being used.

    • chivolet's avatar
      chivolet
      Aspirant

      Thanks CrimpOn for attempting to recreate it.  Not sure how you captured the Wan/Lan traffic unless you did it off of a switch. My Orbi doesn't give you that option other then grabbing logs for "Attempted access to blocked sites and services".  The log did show it was blocking the VPN but I was still able to establish a VPN and go wherever I wanted to go using global protect,  pulse secure,  and HOXX vpn.  Tunnelblick seems to be the only one that stopped working.  I have added as many TCP/UDP ports I can find to put in the services, I have tried the services blocking on always, per schedule, turned it off and then back on.  I just updated to the latest code thinking it may be a code issue but nothing has changed.  I don't think this box fully supports blocking services even though it is listed in the documentation for VPNs.   

      I ran through your test with telnet and had the same finding.  That does work like a champ.

      • CrimpOn's avatar
        CrimpOn
        Guru

        chivolet wrote:

        Thanks CrimpOn for attempting to recreate it.  Not sure how you captured the Wan/Lan traffic unless you did it off of a switch.


        Although I have no solution to the problem, at least I can explain how to capture LAN/WAN traffic.

        On the Orbi debug page (http://orbilogin.net/debug.htm) there is a check box to "Enable LAN/WAN packet capture".

        Then, click on "START CAPTURE". Perform whatever tests you want.  Then click on "SAVE DEBUG LOG".

        This will create a file in the PC Download folder called Debug.zip that has all sorts of stuff in it.  The files I want are LAN.pcap and WAN.pcap which can be opened by a lot of networking programs.  I use Wireshark (a) because it's free, and (b) because it has a lot of display filter options.