30.2. The inetd “Super-Server”
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## 30.2. The inetd “Super-Server”

Contributed by Chern Lee.
Updated by The FreeBSD Documentation Project.

### 30.2.1. Overview

The inetd(8) daemon is sometimes referred to as the “Internet Super-Server” because it manages connections for many services. When a connection is received by inetd, it determines which program the connection is destined for, spawns the particular process and delegates the socket to it (the program is invoked with the service socket as its standard input, output and error descriptors). Running inetd for servers that are not heavily used can reduce the overall system load, when compared to running each daemon individually in stand-alone mode.

Primarily, inetd is used to spawn other daemons, but several trivial protocols are handled directly, such as chargen, auth, and daytime.

This section will cover the basics in configuring inetd through its command-line options and its configuration file, `/etc/inetd.conf`.

### 30.2.2. Settings

inetd is initialized through the rc(8) system. The `inetd_enable` option is set to `NO` by default, but may be turned on by sysinstall during installation, depending on the configuration chosen by the user. Placing:

inetd_enable="YES"

or

inetd_enable="NO"

into `/etc/rc.conf` will enable or disable inetd starting at boot time. The command:

`#` `service inetd rcvar`

can be run to display the current effective setting.

Additionally, different command-line options can be passed to inetd via the `inetd_flags` option.

### 30.2.3. Command-Line Options

Like most server daemons, inetd has a number of options that it can be passed in order to modify its behaviour. See the inetd(8) manual page for the full list of options.

Options can be passed to inetd using the `inetd_flags` option in `/etc/rc.conf`. By default, `inetd_flags` is set to `-wW -C 60`, which turns on TCP wrapping for inetd's services, and prevents any single IP address from requesting any service more than 60 times in any given minute.

Although we mention rate-limiting options below, novice users may be pleased to note that these parameters usually do not need to be modified. These options may be useful if an excessive amount of connections are being established. A full list of options can be found in the inetd(8) manual.

-c maximum

  Specify the default maximum number of simultaneous invocations of each service; the default is unlimited. May be overridden on a per-service basis with the `max-child` parameter.

-C rate

  Specify the default maximum number of times a service can be invoked from a single IP address in one minute; the default is unlimited. May be overridden on a per-service basis with the `max-connections-per-ip-per-minute` parameter.

-R rate

  Specify the maximum number of times a service can be invoked in one minute; the default is 256. A rate of 0 allows an unlimited number of invocations.

-s maximum

  Specify the maximum number of times a service can be invoked from a single IP address at any one time; the default is unlimited. May be overridden on a per-service basis with the `max-child-per-ip` parameter.

### 30.2.4. `inetd.conf`

Configuration of inetd is done via the file `/etc/inetd.conf`.

When a modification is made to `/etc/inetd.conf`, inetd can be forced to re-read its configuration file by running the command:

Example 30.1. Reloading the inetd Configuration File
`#` `service inetd reload`

Each line of the configuration file specifies an individual daemon. Comments in the file are preceded by a “#”. The format of each entry in `/etc/inetd.conf` is as follows:

service-name socket-type protocol {wait|nowait}[/max-child[/max-connections-per-ip-per-minute[/max-child-per-ip]]] user[:group][/login-class] server-program server-program-arguments

An example entry for the ftpd(8) daemon using IPv4 might read:

ftp stream tcp nowait root /usr/libexec/ftpd ftpd -l

service-name

  This is the service name of the particular daemon. It must correspond to a service listed in `/etc/services`. This determines which port inetd must listen to. If a new service is being created, it must be placed in `/etc/services` first.

socket-type

  Either `stream`, `dgram`, `raw`, or `seqpacket`. `stream` must be used for connection-based, TCP daemons, while `dgram` is used for daemons utilizing the UDP transport protocol.

protocol

  One of the following:

  Protocol | Explanation
  --- | ---
  tcp, tcp4 | TCP IPv4
  udp, udp4 | UDP IPv4
  tcp6 | TCP IPv6
  udp6 | UDP IPv6
  tcp46 | Both TCP IPv4 and v6
  udp46 | Both UDP IPv4 and v6

{wait|nowait}[/max-child[/max-connections-per-ip-per-minute[/max-child-per-ip]]]

  `wait|nowait` indicates whether the daemon invoked from inetd is able to handle its own socket or not. `dgram` socket types must use the `wait` option, while stream socket daemons, which are usually multi-threaded, should use `nowait`. `wait` usually hands off multiple sockets to a single daemon, while `nowait` spawns a child daemon for each new socket.

  The maximum number of child daemons inetd may spawn can be set using the `max-child` option. If a limit of ten instances of a particular daemon is needed, a `/10` would be placed after `nowait`. Specifying `/0` allows an unlimited number of children

  In addition to `max-child`, two other options which limit the maximum connections from a single place to a particular daemon can be enabled. `max-connections-per-ip-per-minute` limits the number of connections from any particular IP address per minutes, e.g., a value of ten would limit any particular IP address connecting to a particular service to ten attempts per minute. `max-child-per-ip` limits the number of children that can be started on behalf on any single IP address at any moment. These options are useful to prevent intentional or unintentional excessive resource consumption and Denial of Service (DoS) attacks to a machine.

  In this field, either of `wait` or `nowait` is mandatory. `max-child`, `max-connections-per-ip-per-minute` and `max-child-per-ip` are optional.

  A stream-type multi-threaded daemon without any `max-child`, `max-connections-per-ip-per-minute` or `max-child-per-ip` limits would simply be: `nowait`.

  The same daemon with a maximum limit of ten daemons would read: `nowait/10`.

  The same setup with a limit of twenty connections per IP address per minute and a maximum total limit of ten child daemons would read: `nowait/10/20`.

  These options are utilized by the default settings of the fingerd(8) daemon, as seen here:

  finger stream tcp nowait/3/10 nobody /usr/libexec/fingerd fingerd -s

  Finally, an example of this field with a maximum of 100 children in total, with a maximum of 5 for any one IP address would read: `nowait/100/0/5`.

user

  This is the username that the particular daemon should run as. Most commonly, daemons run as the `root` user. For security purposes, it is common to find some servers running as the `daemon` user, or the least privileged `nobody` user.

server-program

  The full path of the daemon to be executed when a connection is received. If the daemon is a service provided by inetd internally, then `internal` should be used.

server-program-arguments

  This works in conjunction with `server-program` by specifying the arguments, starting with `argv[0]`, passed to the daemon on invocation. If `mydaemon -d` is the command line, `mydaemon -d` would be the value of `server-program-arguments`. Again, if the daemon is an internal service, use `internal` here.

### 30.2.5. Security

Depending on the choices made at install time, many of inetd's services may be enabled by default. If there is no apparent need for a particular daemon, consider disabling it. Place a “#” in front of the daemon in question in `/etc/inetd.conf`, and then reload the inetd configuration. Some daemons, such as fingerd, may not be desired at all because they provide information that may be useful to an attacker.

Some daemons are not security-conscious and have long, or non-existent, timeouts for connection attempts. This allows an attacker to slowly send connections to a particular daemon, thus saturating available resources. It may be a good idea to place `max-connections-per-ip-per-minute`, `max-child` or `max-child-per-ip` limitations on certain daemons if there are too many connections.

By default, TCP wrapping is turned on. Consult the hosts_access(5) manual page for more information on placing TCP restrictions on various inetd invoked daemons.

### 30.2.6. Miscellaneous

daytime, time, echo, discard, chargen, and auth are all internally provided services of inetd.

The auth service provides identity network services, and is configurable to a certain degree, whilst the others are simply on or off.

Consult the inetd(8) manual page for more in-depth information.

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