Simple firewall to block network access on workstations
-------------------------------------------------------

This firewall blocks all outgoing and incoming connections by
default. Selected network conections can be allowed with two
whitelists. One for HTTP/S (Web) URLs and another for network
connections.

This firewall script was originally developed to allow selected
network connections during exams for the "Lernstick Exam
Environment". A Debian Live based distribution for running exams in a
stripped down environment. There is nothing in it that prevents it's
use in other contexts where a simple firewall to block outgoing
connections is needed.

This package is not useful as a general firewall. It is intended for
workstations and not for routers forwarding packets.

** Technical Overview **

The script sets up the following firewall rules:

 * Blocking all connections by default
 * Allow outgoing DNS traffic to enable name resolution
 * Redirection of all connections to port 80/443 to a transparent proxy.
   The proxy does not allow any URLs by default.
 * Whitelist to allow additional connections by protocol (TCP or UDP),
   destination (hostname, network or IP address) and destination port.
 * Logging of unauthorized access to syslog.

The basic blocking rules and port redirection to squid are installed
on system boot by the lernstick-firewall initscript. The network whitelist
is only loaded after a network connection is established (if-up.d script).
It's refreshed every time a new connection is established. This is done
to ensure that DNS name resolution works for the whitelist.

Squid (http://squid-cache.org) is used as a transparent proxy
to allow access to selected URLs. The proxy is run under a separate
UID with a lernstick-firewall specific configuration. It does not use
the standard squid configuration and init script. lernstick-firewall
deactivates the squid init script upon installation.

** Configuration **

All configuration files are in /etc/lernstick-firewall.

*** lernstick-firewall.conf ***

Main configuration file to set proxy port, proxy uid and whitelist
file locations.

*** squid.conf ***

Configuration for squid. Be aware that changing settings in this file
might weaken the security of the firewall.

*** url_whitelist ***

Whitelist file to allow access to selected URLs. One URL per line.
Matching is done with regular expressions. Only parts of the URL have
to match. If you want to match the full URL, prepend your pattern with
Matching is done case insensitive by default.
This can be changed in squid.conf.

Examples:
Allow everything about firewalls on wikipedia. This also allows
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firewall_(computing).

    ^http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firewall

Allow only one exact URL

    ^http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firewall$
    
Allow everything that contains the word firewall:

    firewall
    
*** net_whitelist ***

file for additional firewall rules
FILE FORMAT: One rule per line, protocol target port (space separated)
protocol is either tcp or udp
target can be a hostname, netmaks or ip address
port is either a port name form /etc/services or a numerical port
lines starting with # are ignored

Example:
# allow printing to HP JetDirect at printer.local
tcp printer.local 9100

*** ca.pem ***

Certificate and private key of the CA that squid uses for generating 
certificates. This certificate is valid for 30000 days which might be changed
by generating a new one.

 -- Tiago Santos <tiago.santos@students.fhnw.ch>  Fri, 21 Mar 2017 16:09:00 +0200