SSH-BASED VIRTUAL PRIVATE NETWORKS
ssh contains support for Virtual Private Network (VPN) tunnelling using the tun(4) network pseudo-device, allowing two networks to be joined securely. The sshd_config(5) configuration option PermitTunnel controls whether the server supports this, and at what level (layer 2 or
3 traffic).
The following example would connect client network 10.0.50.0/24 with remote network 10.0.99.0/24 using a point-to-point connection from 10.1.1.1 to 10.1.1.2, provided that the SSH server running on the gateway to the remote network, at 192.168.1.15, allows it.
On the client:
# ssh -f -w 0:1 192.168.1.15 true
# ifconfig tun0 10.1.1.1 10.1.1.2 netmask 255.255.255.252
# route add 10.0.99.0/24 10.1.1.2
On the server:
# ifconfig tun1 10.1.1.2 10.1.1.1 netmask 255.255.255.252
# route add 10.0.50.0/24 10.1.1.1
Client access may be more finely tuned via the /root/.ssh/authorized_keys file (see below) and the PermitRootLogin server option. The following entry would permit connections on tun(4) device 1 from user ``jane'' and on tun device 2 from user ``john'', if PermitRootLogin is
set to ``forced-commands-only'':
tunnel="1",command="sh /etc/netstart tun1" ssh-rsa ... jane
tunnel="2",command="sh /etc/netstart tun2" ssh-rsa ... john
Since an SSH-based setup entails a fair amount of overhead, it may be more suited to temporary setups, such as for wireless VPNs. More permanent VPNs are better provided by tools such as ipsecctl(8) and isakmpd(8).