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nbdkit-tls(1) NBDKIT nbdkit-tls(1) NAME nbdkit-tls - authentication and encryption of NBD connections (sometimes called "SSL") SYNOPSIS nbdkit [--tls=off|on|require] [--tls-certificates=/path/to/certificates] [--tls-psk=/path/to/pskfile] [--tls-verify-peer] PLUGIN [...] DESCRIPTION TLS (authentication and encryption, sometimes incorrectly called "SSL") is supported if nbdkit was compiled with GnuTLS. This allows the server to verify that the client is allowed access, and to encrypt the contents of the protocol in transit over the network. TLS can be disabled or enabled by specifying either --tls=off or --tls=on. With --tls=off, if a client tries to use TLS to connect, it will be rejected by the server (in other words, as if the server doesn't support TLS). --tls=on means that the client may choose to connect either with or without TLS. --tls=require enables TLS and rejects all non-TLS connection attempts. This prevents downgrade attacks where a malicious proxy pretends not to support TLS in order to force either the client or server to communicate in plaintext. Example If certificates have been set up correctly then you should be able to start a TLS server by doing: nbdkit --tls=require memory 1G and connect to it by doing: nbdinfo nbds://localhost If certificates are in a non-standard directory and you have libnbd 1.10: nbdkit --tls=require --tls-certificates=/certs memory 1G nbdinfo nbds://localhost?tls-certificates=/certs TLS with X.509 certificates When nbdkit starts up, it loads TLS certificates from some built-in paths, or from the directory specified by the --tls-certificates option. In this directory, nbdkit expects to find several files: ca-cert.pem The Certificate Authority certificate. server-cert.pem The server certificate. server-cert-N.pem (Optional) Additional server certificates (where "N" is 0, 1, ...) server-key.pem The server private key. server-key-N.pem (Optional) Additional server private keys (where "N" is 0, 1, ...) ca-crl.pem (Optional) The certificate revocation list. Setting up the Certificate Authority This step only needs to be done once per organization. It may be that your organization already has a CA. $ certtool --generate-privkey > ca-key.pem $ chmod 0600 ca-key.pem The ca-key.pem file is the CA private key and is extremely sensitive data. With possession of this key, anyone can create certificates pretending to be your organization! To create the CA certificate file: $ cat > ca.info <<EOF cn = Name of your organization ca cert_signing_key EOF $ certtool --generate-self-signed \ --load-privkey ca-key.pem \ --template ca.info \ --outfile ca-cert.pem Issuing a server certificate for the nbdkit server Each nbdkit server (or host) needs a secret key and certificate. $ certtool --generate-privkey > server-key.pem $ chmod 0600 server-key.pem The server key file is sensitive. Setting the mode to 0600 helps to prevent other users on the same machine from reading it. The common name ("cn" below) field must be the fully qualified hostname that the client connects to. However most clients and servers including nbdkit support the Subject Alternative Name extension (RFC 2818) which uses the "dns_name" and "ip_address" fields and deprecates "cn". $ cat > server.info <<EOF organization = Name of your organization cn = nbd-server.example.com dns_name = nbd-server dns_name = nbd-server.example.com ip_address = 10.0.1.2 ip_address = 2001:24::92 tls_www_server encryption_key signing_key EOF $ certtool --generate-certificate \ --load-ca-certificate ca-cert.pem \ --load-ca-privkey ca-key.pem \ --load-privkey server-key.pem \ --template server.info \ --outfile server-cert.pem Issuing and checking client certificates Note: You don't need to create client certificates unless you want to check and limit which clients can connect to nbdkit. nbdkit does not check client certificates unless you specify the --tls-verify-peer option on the command line. There are other methods for limiting access to nbdkit including nbdkit-ip-filter(1). For each client you should generate a private key and a client certificate: $ certtool --generate-privkey > client-key.pem $ chmod 0600 client-key.pem The client key file is sensitive. The client DNS name ("cn" below) is the client's name for information only. $ cat > client.info <<EOF country = US state = New York locality = New York organization = Name of your organization cn = client.example.com tls_www_client encryption_key signing_key EOF $ certtool --generate-certificate \ --load-ca-certificate ca-cert.pem \ --load-ca-privkey ca-key.pem \ --load-privkey client-key.pem \ --template client.info \ --outfile client-cert.pem Client certificates do not need to be present anywhere on the nbdkit host. You don't need to copy them into nbdkit's TLS certificates directory. The security comes from the fact that the client must present a client certificate signed by the Certificate Authority, and nbdkit can check this because it has the ca-cert.pem file. To enable checking of client certificates, specify the --tls-verify-peer option on the command line. Clients which don't present a valid certificate (eg. not signed, incorrect signature) are denied. Also denied are clients which present a valid certificate signed by another CA. Also denied are clients with certificates added to the certificate revocation list (ca-crl.pem). Connecting nbd-client to nbdkit with TLS certificates With the TLS certificates files generated above in the current directory (".") you can use: nbdkit --tls=require --tls-certificates=. --tls-verify-peer memory 1G nbd-client /dev/nbd0 \ -cacertfile ca-cert.pem \ -certfile client-cert.pem \ -keyfile client-key.pem --tls-verify-peer is only required if you want to check the client certificate. If you want to allow any client to connect then you can omit it. TLS with Pre-Shared Keys (PSK) As a simpler alternative to TLS certificates, you may use pre-shared keys to authenticate clients. Create a PSK file containing one or more "username:key" pairs. It is easiest to use psktool(1) for this: mkdir -m 0700 /tmp/keys psktool -u alice -p /tmp/keys/keys.psk The PSK file contains the hex-encoded random keys in plaintext. Any client which can read this file will be able to connect to the server. Use the nbdkit --tls-psk option to start the server: nbdkit --tls=require --tls-psk=/tmp/keys/keys.psk file disk.img This option overrides X.509 certificate authentication. Clients must supply one of the usernames in the PSK file and the corresponding key in order to connect. An example of connecting using nbdinfo(1) using an NBD URI is: nbdinfo 'nbds://alice@localhost?tls-psk-file=/tmp/keys/keys.psk' An example of connecting using qemu-img(1) is: qemu-img info \ --object tls-creds-psk,id=tls0,dir=/tmp/keys,username=alice,endpoint=client \ --image-opts \ file.driver=nbd,file.host=localhost,file.port=10809,file.tls-creds=tls0,file.export=/ Default TLS behaviour If nbdkit was compiled without GnuTLS support, then TLS is disabled and TLS connections will be rejected (as if --tls=off was specified on the command line). Also it is impossible to turn on TLS in this scenario. You can tell if nbdkit was compiled without GnuTLS support because "nbdkit --dump-config" will contain "tls=no". If TLS certificates cannot be loaded either from the built-in path or from the directory specified by --tls-certificates, then TLS defaults to disabled. Turning TLS on will give a warning (--tls=on) or error (--tls=require) about the missing certificates. If TLS certificates can be loaded from the built-in path or from the --tls-certificates directory, then TLS will by default be enabled (like --tls=on), but it is not required. Clients can choose whether or not to use TLS and whether or not to present certificates. TLS client certificates are not checked by default unless you specify --tls-verify-peer. If the --tls-psk option is used then TLS is enabled (but not required). To ensure that all clients are authorized you must use --tls=require. Each of these defaults is insecure to some extent (including --tls=on which could be subject to a downgrade attack). If you expect TLS then it is best to specify --tls=require, and if you want to check client certificates, additionally use the --tls-verify-peer option. Controlling TLS fallback to plaintext When --tls=on is used, the connection can fall back to plaintext. You can use nbdkit-tls-fallback-filter(1) to provide safe fallback content to plaintext connections. With this filter the underlying plugin content is only served on secure connections. Alternatively a plugin may wish to serve different content depending on whether the client is using TLS. The function nbdkit_is_tls(3) can be used during the ".open" callback for that purpose. NBD URIs for TLS Tools such nbdcopy(1), nbdinfo(1) and nbdsh(1) (from libnbd(3)) allow you to use "nbds://" or "nbds+unix://" URIs to connect to nbdkit servers using TLS. The syntax is fully documented in the NBD URI specification: https://github.com/NetworkBlockDevice/nbd/blob/master/doc/uri.md. This section contains an outline. You can also find further examples in nbd_connect_uri(3). Use the nbdkit --print-uri option to print the URI when nbdkit starts up. nbds://example.com Connect over TCP with TLS, to "example.com" port 10809. If the server does not support TLS then this will fail. nbds+unix:///?socket=SOCKET As above, but connect over a Unix domain socket called SOCKET. nbds+unix:///?socket=SOCKET&tls-certificates=DIR As above, but specify the directory DIR containing TLS certificates (used by the client to verify the server, and to present client authentication to the server). Note this requires libnbd 1.10. nbds+unix:///?socket=SOCKET&tls-psk-file=FILENAME As above, but use TLS with Pre-Shared Keys (PSK), stored in the secrets file FILENAME. nbds+unix://alice@/?socket=SOCKET&tls-psk-file=FILENAME As above, but use "alice" as the username. Default location of certificates Without --tls-certificates nbdkit and libnbd look in several locations for certificates. If nbdkit is started as a non-root user (note this does not include use of the -u or -g options), nbdkit looks in each of these paths in turn: $HOME/.pki/nbdkit/ $HOME/.config/pki/nbdkit/ If nbdkit is started as root: $sysconfdir/pki/nbdkit/ where $sysconfdir is set when nbdkit is compiled, usually /etc. (Use "nbdkit --dump-config" and look at the "root_tls_certificates_dir" setting to get the actual directory built into the binary.) In libnbd the paths are different. For non-root: $HOME/.pki/libnbd/ $HOME/.config/pki/libnbd/ For root: $sysconfdir/pki/libnbd/ In nbdkit you can override these directories by using --tls-certificates=/path/to/certificates. In libnbd you can use nbd_set_tls_certificates(3). In libnbd 1.10 you can append "&tls-certificates=/path/to/certificates" to URIs. Choice of TLS algorithms TLS has a bewildering choice of algorithms that can be used. These are controlled by the TLS priority string, described in full in the section "Priority strings" in the GnuTLS manual If not set anywhere, this defaults to "NORMAL" which, to quote the GnuTLS documentation: ""NORMAL" means all "secure" ciphersuites. The 256-bit ciphers are included as a fallback only. The ciphers are sorted by security margin." The nbdkit default can also be set either at "./configure" time or at run time. You can set the TLS priority so that it can be read from a file: ./configure --with-tls-priority=@SYSTEM which means use the policy from /etc/crypto-policies/config, or ./configure --with-tls-priority=@NBDKIT,SYSTEM which means use the policy from /etc/crypto-policies/local.d/nbdkit.config and fall back to /etc/crypto-policies/config if the first file does not exist. At run time, the TLS priority string can be overridden using the nbdkit --tls-priority option. Debugging TLS connections Encrypted connections makes snooping on network traffic with Wireshark impossible, by design. The TLS library used by nbdkit, called gnutls, supports the "SSLKEYLOGFILE" standard: https://web.archive.org/web/20200118013150/https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Projects/NSS/Key_Log_Format Before running nbdkit set the environment variable to point to a log file (note it will append to the file if it already exists): SSLKEYLOGFILE=/tmp/keylog nbdkit [...] In Wireshark go to Edit Preferences Protocols TLS and set (Pre)-Master-Secret log filename to the log file name. Wireshark should be able to see the unencrypted traffic. For further information read: https://wiki.wireshark.org/TLS#using-the-pre-master-secret SEE ALSO nbdkit(1), nbdkit-luks-filter(1), nbdkit-tls-fallback-filter(1), nbdkit_is_tls(3), nbdkit_peer_tls_dn(3), nbdkit_peer_tls_issuer_dn(3), nbdcopy(1), nbdfuse(1), nbdinfo(1), nbdsh(1), nbd_connect_uri(3), nbd_set_tls(3), nbd_set_tls_certificates(3), psktool(1), https://github.com/NetworkBlockDevice/nbd/blob/master/doc/proto.md, https://github.com/NetworkBlockDevice/nbd/blob/master/doc/uri.md, https://nbd.sourceforge.io/. AUTHORS Eric Blake Richard W.M. Jones Pino Toscano COPYRIGHT Copyright Red Hat LICENSE Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions are met: • Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer. • Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution. • Neither the name of Red Hat nor the names of its contributors may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software without specific prior written permission. THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY RED HAT AND CONTRIBUTORS ''AS IS'' AND ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL RED HAT OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE. nbdkit-1.46.0 2026-03-04 nbdkit-tls(1)
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