this post was submitted on 02 Apr 2025
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What steps do you take to secure your server and your selfhosted services? (lemmy.selfhostcat.com)
submitted 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
58 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

Inspired by this comment to try to learn what I'm missing.

  • Cloudflare proxy
  • Reverse Proxy
  • Fail2ban
  • Docker containers on their own networks

Another concern I have is does it need to be on a separate machine on a vlan from the rest of the network or is that too much?

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[–] [email protected] 35 points 3 weeks ago (5 children)

Disable password authentication on SSH

Enable firewall and block all ports you're not using(most firewalls do this by default)

Switch to a LTS kernel(not security related, but it keeps things going smooth... Technically it is safer since it gets updated less often so it is a bit more battle tested? Never investigated whenever a LTS kernel is safer than a standard one)

Use Caddy to proxy to services instead of directly exposing them out

HTTPS for web stuff(Caddy does it automatically)

[–] [email protected] 21 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

This and fail2ban

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Anything else?

[–] [email protected] 9 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

There are ip lists that let you iptables drop all traffic from China and Russia.

Strongly recommend.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

I was auto banning all countries but my own but now I’m hosting one resource that has an audience including Chinese…

Good advice outside of this use case! :)

[–] [email protected] 4 points 3 weeks ago

Yeah, there were other countries to ban, but those 2 cut my attacks down 90%.

Also consider a honeypot that triggers when anyone tries to ssh it at all.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (1 children)

My UDM has this capability. I've blocked quite a few countries that it logged as trying to get into my network. Great little internet cylinder.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 weeks ago

Have the rack mounted one, I usually roll my own router but I'm glad to have someone else making sure I don't do anything stupid for security.

It's not perfect, but it's peace of mind.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

This, but I prefer nginx.

And no real need for tailscale or cloudflare. If you do not like to depend on a third party service, either port forward and ddns or an external vps+wire guard if you have gcnat

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

This is a valid solution but honestly how is using VPS not depending on third party?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 weeks ago

It is, but you are free to switch at any time provider, there is no technological lock in like with cloudflare or tailscale (i know there is a free self hostable version, not talking about that).

So just rent a new one and switch your wireguard there.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 3 weeks ago

Dropping instead of blocking might technically be better because it wastes a bit more bot time and they see it as "it doesn't exist" rather than an obsticle to try exploits on. Not sure if that is true though.

For me:

  • ssh server only with keys

  • absolutely no ssh forwarding, only available to local network via firewall rules

  • docker socket proxy for everything that needs socket access

  • drop non-used ports, limit IPs for local-only services (e.g. paperless)

  • crowdsec on traefik for the rest (sadly it blocks my VPN IPs also)

  • Authelia over everything that doesn't break the native apps (jellyfin and home assistant are the two that it breaks so far, and HA was very intermittent so I made a separate authelia rule and mobile DNS entry for slightly reduced rules)

  • proper umask rules on all docker directories (or as much as possible)

  • main drive FDE with a separate boot drive with FDE keyfile on a dongle that is removed except for updates and booting to make snatch-and-grabs useless and compromising bootloader impractical

  • full disk encryption with passworded data drives, so even if a smash and grab happens when I leave the dongle in, the sensitive data is still encrypted and the keys aren't in memory (makes a startup script with a password needed, so no automated startups for me)

For more info, I followed a lot of stuff on: https://github.com/imthenachoman/How-To-Secure-A-Linux-Server

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 weeks ago

Caddy or any other (reputable) reverse proxy. I think Nginx Proxy Manager would be best for beginner thanks to GUI.