Runing Sophos UTM virtualized or on dedicated hardware?

widdde said:

Hi!
I have a computer with a Core I7 2600K, 32GB ram, 4 Intel nics, and I'm planning to run Sophos UTM on this as my primary firewall (home use with some internal and some public servers behind).

I think it is quite a waste to use the hardware as a firewall only, I don't think Sophos need an I7 with 32GB ram, or am I wrong?

I have a little thought to run ESXI on the machine to have some more vm:s running on it in parallell with Sophos UTM.

I think the hardware can handle a one or two vm:s alongside a Sophos install..?

My biggest concern are the security, how secure is it to run the firewall virtualized? For some reason my heart screams a little when I'm thinking to run it virtualized, because
a dedicated approach should be more secure, because you don't expose a virtualization platform to the net as you do with a virtualized approach.

But is it common that hackers find holes on the virtualization platform and can gain access to the internal lans? How safe are virtualization platforms nowadays?

I don't think it is an uncommon approach on companies to run it virtualized, but maybe I'm wrong. This is for personal use in a home environment, but I still want secure networks.

I may run it virtualized if you say that it is safe.. :P

For your information: I have a 250/100Mbps fiber connection to my house.

Thanks in advance! 

Widde,

You can run Sophos SG UTM and XG Firewall virtualized, but in your situation. To do this, you would have to allow the unfiltered traffic onto your network in order to filter it in a virtualized environment.  This is complicated and expensive for most home environments as it requires managed switches for VLANs and robust servers for virtualization.

For most home settings, all you need to do is deploy the UTM/Firewall on a small firewall appliance in between your fiber gateway and your internal network.  The device required is very simple computer with two or more ethernet ports.  You can purchase a firewall computer with RAM and SSD installed, or you can purchase a barebones systems and add your own RAM/storage.  In most cases, you don't need a more than 8GBs of RAM or 64GB of storage.  If you have an old computer laying around, you can use that too, but be warned that UTM and XG installers wipe the hard drive during installation.

On your fiber connection, I would recommend a Protectli Vault.  It includes multiple ports for organizing your LAN, virtualization, Wi-Fi, and other networks.  Each port will become an interface.  Each interface can have a default LAN on which you can add layers of VLANs.  In the default Gateway mode, your UTM will be the network router, and through it, you can create, manage, and combine all the interfaces, LANs, or VLANs.  You can do a lot of other things too.  If you prefer to use your existing router as the network manager, you can set the UTM in a Bridge mode.

I moved from the Sophos SG UTM to the Sophos XG Firewall.  It was easy because they use the same appliances.  My XG Firewall is in a ZBOX CI325 Nano with 4GB RAM and a 32GB SSD connected to an Arris SurfBoard SB6190 cable modem to a on a 350Mbps cable connection.  The Zbox only has two ports WAN and LAN.  The only thing on the LAN is an Apple Time Machine in bridge mode.  This gives me two networks, the default LAN for my internal wired/wireless/backup network and Guest Wi-Fi on a separate VLAN.

Hi David and thanks for your response!

Well, I'm not an ordinary home user, I already have 2x 24 ports managed switches and 4 x 8 ports managed switches.

I currently run Sophos UTM on hardware where I can't get full speed on my 250/100 Mbps connection with IPS enabled.

The speed drops about 100Mbps to 150Mbps, this is because snort is single threaded and therefor I planned to beef upp
the cpu to a Core I7 (but run it in a virtualized environment). 

I'm already running a couple of vlans in my home and will continue to do this after the change to other hardware.

From my fiber connection I will connect ESXI on a dedicated network card that only the firewall will use and all other network will reside on
another network card, the lan side, in the virtualized firewall.

My concern is if ESXI will be a security issue because the firewall isn't the first physical box, but if ESXI doesn't listen on the interface where I plug internet in

maybe it is a secure solution?

Dude, that was all FUD.  VM escape attacks are rare and you are not going to be targeted by these.  Just run it virtualized and be done with it.  VLAN your switch if you cannot physically segment and you will be fine.

Okey, I see, thanks for your response. 
I don't know what to think. Half the net seem to say it is totally ok to run it virtualized, and the rest
says it is super insecure.

My switches will be behind the lan of the Sophos UTM, the ESXI box will have one of its nic direct connected to
the fiber box (to the net) and this network card will only be used by Sophos UTM VM. On the lan side of the UTM
i will divide my network in some more VLANS..

(Fiber box (internet)) -> ESXI box with a nic connected to Sophos UTM VM -> Lan side with x VLANS -> Switches that have VLAN configurations -> servers and clients on different vlans. (The UTM has the rules which computer can talk to which server and so on so all traffic will go through the UTM between the VLANS)

I can see why people think this can be dangerous, because the ESXI box with it's OS is connected physically to the net running a virtual firewall,

but if nothing in ESXI host is listening on the card that is connected to the WAN NIC in my ESXI, how insecure is that?

darrellr said:

Dude, that was all FUD.  VM escape attacks are rare and you are not going to be targeted by these.  Just run it virtualized and be done with it.  VLAN your switch if you cannot physically segment and you will be fine.

 

I completely agree!

i run this on my home lab on 3 locations, all virtual and in vmware, We even have 100s of virtual UTM at customer sites. So dedicated HW at home for UTM is so last year, IF you have a big server for that - my oppinion :-)

But it takes at little more experience with vmware, but if your physical server has two nics, there is no need to go down that vlan road :-)

I needed to go with this CPU to make IPS / snort fully support my 300MB connection :-)

Thanks for your response!

My server has 4 physical Intel NICS. One of them will be used only by the Sophos UTM. (And regarding the CPU I will only run one or two small VM:s on the server
and Sophos UTM of course)
Unfortuneately I can't pass through the network card to the Sophos VM, because my Core I7 2600k does not have Vt/d (the k model does not have this)

Will this be an issue?

widdde said:

Thanks for your response!

 

My server has 4 physical Intel NICS. One of them will be used only by the Sophos UTM.
Unfortuneately I can't pass through the network card to the Sophos VM, because my Core I7 2600k does not have Vt/d (the k model does not have this)

Will this be an issue?

 

Absolutely not, just create a new vSwitch in VMWARE and add the physical nic to it, after that, create a new nic in the SOPHOS VM thats assignes to the new vswitch port group :-)

VMDirectPath is only needed in specialt setups ex. graphics VDI aso.

Thank you!
Will try this in my labbox first! :)

widdde said:

Okey, thanks for your response.
I know that every device in the network and devices that is carried out of the network can be potential dangerous, but somewhere we have to draw a line. This is my home network and I can't be that paranoid with phones carried in and out of the network and so on.

But I understand your point to not virtualize Sophos and it was this answer I was looking for. I think I will run UTM on dedicated hardware. Right now it is running on a box with a J1900 celeron (I think it is 2Ghz per core) and 8 GB ram. As I have understood IPS can run multiple instances of snort and when I do a benchmark test of my speed I can't get more than 150Mbps on that particular connection, but when surfing on other sites while doing a test I can get more bandwidth because another core will take care of that connection. Am i right?

It felt wrong to virtualize the firewall, but I wanted more information regarding this issue and exactly how insecure it is to expose the hypervisor. 

I have 2 servers running ESXI and both of them are behind my dedicated UTM today, and I think I will keep it that way. Maybe I use my Core I7 with yet another ESXI install and run some vm:s on it and keep my J1900 celeron box to continue to run Sophos on it (dedicated)

 

David Birdsall said:

DarrellR claims that VMWare attacks are rare.  If that is so, why is WMWare, Sophos, Symantec, Palo Alto, and so many major security vendors in a rush to ensure they have virtualization covered?  Well, it's because virtualization is the easiest and fastest way to deploy malware, specifically ransomware.  It's so easy to do.  Any Keyboard/Mouse/Video or connection can allow malware to inject into your VMWare because it connects to the VM holding the UTM, not to the UTM.  Any USB, network, or optical drive connection can also provide the same problems in the same ways.  All these vector I mentions can be in one single virtual desktop client.  Your shared resources of CPU, RAM, and storage systems NAS/SAN can also be a vector for injection.  The list goes on and on.

 

Virtualization is covered because it sells agents.  FUD sells agents.  Do you have any evidence that virtualization escapes are NOT rare?  What the hell does virtualization have to do with malware/ransomware spreading?  Where are you seeing this as an attack vector?  The MOST likely method of infection will be phishing or drive-bys on websites.  Some consumer gateways have vulnerabilities that leads to c2 infections.  But vm escapes or attacks on the hypervisor from a guest machine just don't happen.  Imagine the fallout if those were common.  Hosting companies would be shutting down en mass.   VMware would be out of business.  Amazon would have to shut down AWS.  Seriously.  This is FUD, pure and simple (at least until it is not).  For a home user, dedicating all that hardware to a UTM is a waste of resources.  They are far more likely to visit a shady p0rn site or get hit with malvertising or have an asteroid fall on their house than they are to be compromised by a vm escape attack these days.

Again, what you are recommending is solid for large business, but SMB and definitely home, this is good enough.

The only thing im worried about is attacks from the outside, from the net. This because the hypervisor is physically connected to the net instead of the utm.

I want a really secure lan, thats why im asking and i can of course run a separate box for utm but as said, feels like a waste.. But the security is prio one (from the net, not from lan side)

As stated, many of us run this way without issue.  Like David said, it ultimately comes down to your comfort level, but I really doubt you are harboring the droids they are looking for in your home network.

As stated, many of us run this way without issue.  Like David said, it ultimately comes down to your comfort level, but I really doubt you are harboring the droids they are looking for in your home network.