[cod] Game server whitelisting rules

Tue Apr 17 15:34:48 EDT 2012

Also, just a quick shout out to Escaped Turkey (escapedturkey.com), who 
has been a big help in this whole development process.

The rules have been a collaboration between us for several months now, 
to get to the point where the rules are mature enough to withstand so 
many different attacks.  Escaped Turkey was one of the first companies 
to give ServerArk a try, which led to moving all the ServerArk logic 
into the kernel with these custom iptables rules, and to eventually 
getting the whitelisting working.

Thanks ET!

:)

/__________________________________
Boyd G. Gafford Ph.D.
Manager of Software Development
Westport Research Associates Inc.
7001 Blue Ridge Blvd
Raytown, MO 64133
(816) 358-8990
drboyd at westportresearch.com
/

On 04/17/2012 10:58 AM, escapedturkey wrote:
> On top of that, using webmin and usermin, I have developed scripts (to 
> utilize Boyd's scripts) where the user simply clicks on of two 
> buttons, then within 30 minutes protection is enabled or disabled. 
> There is another script to display the protection status. This way 
> root runs a script, every 30 minutes, searches to see who has enabled 
> or disabled protection, then adds or removes the rules to iptables.
>
> For more information on how the scripts work, please see the following:
>
> https://www.escapedturkey.com/links/serverprotection
>
> I will gladly share these scripts as well. Please drop me an e-mail if 
> you are interested. The more protection we have for everyone's game 
> servers, the better the community will be. =)
>
> On Tue, Apr 17, 2012 at 11:12 AM, Boyd G. Gafford Ph.D. 
> <drboyd at westportresearch.com <mailto:drboyd at westportresearch.com>> wrote:
>
>     Just wanted to let everyone know that I am making the dynamic
>     whitelisting iptables rules I have been testing available to
>     anyone who runs a Q3-protocol server under Linux and wants to try
>     them out.  These rules were designed for the most severe of all
>     attacks, and that is attacks where the source IP is spoofed and is
>     random.  It also works for attacks from a single IP as well, as
>     well as indirect reflection attacks.
>
>     We have 2 commercial server companies using these rules currently
>     in their production environment, and I am currently working with
>     two more.  I also have test servers running on several VPS's that
>     I use for development.
>
>     So what do the iptables do?  Here's the list:
>
>     1) Players have their IP saved automatically at the kernel level
>     when they join a game server, and then those IPs are used as a
>     filter for other rules.  When they leave the game server the IP is
>     retired after 10 minutes.  (This is what we call a whitelisted
>     player).  This is the main guts of the protection, as identifying
>     valid players is important to mitigating attacks.
>
>     2) Server query packets like 'getstatus' and 'getinfo' are rate
>     limited to 10/sec to prevent lag when they are used in a DOS
>     attack.  Players that are whitelisted have their packets allowed
>     (so they can see server status while in game even during an attack).
>
>     3) 'getchallenge' packets (normally used by a player to join the
>     game) are rate limited to 2/sec, to prevent lag when they are used
>     in a DOS attack.  Players that are whitelisted always have their
>     requests to join the server processed.  This allows a player who
>     was recently playing the ability to join the server again, even
>     when the DOSer is trying to lock down the population on the server
>     by spamming fake players joining.
>
>     4) All other packets are rate limited per whitelisted player IP to
>     no more than 100/second, to prevent lag when a DOSer has stolen a
>     valid player IP address and is attacking with it in an attempt to
>     break through the whitelist rules.
>
>     5) Attempts to use your game server as a reflector to attack other
>     game servers is blocked (due to rate limiting in 1-4).
>
>     6) Reflection attack packets hitting your server are dropped
>     (again due to rate limiting in 1-4).
>
>     7) A custom packet (not part of the Q3 protocol) can be sent by a
>     player to break into and join a game that is under 24/7
>     'getchallenge' attack.  This is one of the slicker features of the
>     iptables rules, as this 'server lockdown' DOS attack is now easily
>     breached.
>
>
>     The iptables rules are added dynamically per server IP:PORT pair. 
>     That way the rules affect nothing but UDP packets to that game
>     server.  No other types of packets are affected whatsoever.  To
>     make it easy, the rules have been put into shell scripts.
>
>     Example:  Protect the game running on 10.1.2.3 port 28000.
>
>     # ./protectgame.sh 10.1.2.3 28000
>
>     Example:  Show the iptables rules currently protecting the game
>     running on 10.1.2.3 port 28000.
>
>     # ./listgame.sh 10.1.2.3 28000
>
>     Example:  Remove the iptables rules protecting the game running on
>     10.1.2.3 port 28000.
>
>     # ./unprotectgame.sh 10.1.2.3 28000
>
>     Rather than just send the scripts to the whole list here, I've
>     decided to ask anyone interested to Email me personally and
>     request it.  If you run a commercial gaming service (or even your
>     own COD server and agree not to share it with anyone else), I will
>     be happy to send it to you and help you understand how to use it
>     in your environment.
>
>     Thanks,
>
>     /Boyd/
>
>     /__________________________________
>     Boyd G. Gafford Ph.D.
>     Manager of Software Development
>     Westport Research Associates Inc.
>     7001 Blue Ridge Blvd
>     Raytown, MO 64133
>     (816) 358-8990 <tel:%28816%29%20358-8990>
>     drboyd at westportresearch.com <mailto:drboyd at westportresearch.com>
>     /
>
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>
>
>
>
> -- 
> EscapedTurkey.com Billing and Support
> https://www.escapedturkey.com/helpdesk
>
>
>
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