• Mac OS X Server,  Mac Security

    Configure The Adaptive Firewall In macOS Server 5.4 for High Sierra

    macOS Server 5.4 running on High Sierra (macOS 10.13) has an adaptive firewall built in, or a firewall that controls incoming access based on clients attempting to abuse the server. The firewall automatically blocks incoming connections that it considers to be dangerous. For example, if a client attempts too many incorrect logins then a firewall rule restricts that user from attempting to communicate with the server for 15 minutes. If you’re troubleshooting and you accidentally tripped up one of these rules then it can be a bit frustrating. Which is why Apple gives us afctl, a tool that interacts with the adaptive firewall. To enable the adaptive firewall, use the -f…

  • Mac OS X,  Mac OS X Server,  Mac Security

    Configure The Adaptive Firewall In macOS Server 5.2

    macOS Server 5.2 running on Sierra 10.12) has an adaptive firewall built in, or a firewall that controls incoming access based on clients attempting to abuse the server. The firewall automatically blocks incoming connections that it considers to be dangerous. For example, if a client attempts too many incorrect logins then a firewall rule restricts that user from attempting to communicate with the server for 15 minutes. If you’re troubleshooting and you accidentally tripped up one of these rules then it can be a bit frustrating. Which is why Apple gives us afctl, a tool that interacts with the adaptive firewall. The most basic task you can do with the firewall is…

  • Mac OS X Server

    Manage The Adaptive Firewall Options In OS X Server 5

    OS X Server 5 (El Capitan 10.11 or Yosemite 10.10) has an adaptive firewall built in, or a firewall that controls incoming access based on clients attempting to abuse the server. The firewall automatically blocks incoming connections that it considers to be dangerous. For example, if a client attempts too many incorrect logins then a firewall rule restricts that user from attempting to communicate with the server for 15 minutes. If you’re troubleshooting and you accidentally tripped up one of these rules then it can be a bit frustrating. Which is why Apple gives us afctl, a tool that interacts with the adaptive firewall. The most basic task you can…

  • Mac OS X,  Mac OS X Server,  Mac Security,  Mass Deployment

    Using afctl To Manage The Adaptive Firewall In OS X Yosemite Server

    OS X Server (Yosemite 10.10 running Server 3.5 has an adaptive firewall built in, or a firewall that controls incoming access based on clients attempting to abuse the server. The firewall automatically blocks incoming connections that it considers to be dangerous. For example, if a client attempts too many incorrect logins then a firewall rule restricts that user from attempting to communicate with the server for 15 minutes. If you’re troubleshooting and you accidentally tripped up one of these rules then it can be a bit frustrating. Which is why Apple gives us afctl, a tool that interacts with the adaptive firewall. The most basic task you can do with…

  • Mac OS X Server,  Mac Security

    Manage The Adaptive Firewall in Mavericks Server

    OS X Server (Mavericks 10.9 running Server 3) has an adaptive firewall built in, or a firewall that controls incoming access based on clients attempting to abuse the server. The firewall automatically blocks incoming connections that it considers to be dangerous. For example, if a client attempts too many incorrect logins then a firewall rule restricts that user from attempting to communicate with the server for 15 minutes. If you’re troubleshooting and you accidentally tripped up one of these rules then it can be a bit frustrating. Which is why Apple gives us afctl, a tool that interacts with the adaptive firewall. The most basic task you can do with…

  • Mac OS X Server,  Mac Security

    Adaptive Firewall Statistics for OS X Server

    I wrote up afctl (the command line tool to manage the OS X Server Adaptive Firewall) awhile back here https://krypted.com//mac-security/a-little-more-about-afctl-in-os-x-server. One thing I didn’t touch on is statistics. There’s a nice little command called hb_summary located in /Applications/Server.app/Contents/ServerRoot/System/Library/CoreServices/AdaptiveFirewall.bundle/Contents/MacOS that provides statistics for blocked hosts. To see statistics about how much the Adaptive Firewall is being used, just run the command with no options: /Applications/Server.app/Contents/ServerRoot/System/Library/CoreServices/AdaptiveFirewall.bundle/Contents/MacOS/hb_summary The output provides the following information (helpful if plugging this information into a tool like Splunk): Date Date statistics start Number of hosts blocked Addresses blocked Number of times each address was blocked Last time a host was blocked Total number of times a block was…

  • Mac OS X Server,  Mac Security

    Managing Lion Server's Adaptive Firewall From the Command Line

    Previously, I had done an article on using the adaptive firewall in Mac OS x Server. But I hadn’t looked at controlling it from the command line yet. In Lion Server, the firewall automatically blocks incoming connections that it considers to be dangerous. For example, if a client attempts too many incorrect logins then a firewall rule restricts that user from attempting to communicate with the server for 15 minutes. If you’re troubleshooting and you accidentally tripped up one of these rules then it can be a bit frustrating. Which is why Apple gives us afctl, a tool that interacts with the adaptive firewall. The most basic task you can…