Topic: Free/SWAN or PPTP

[Mike]

Hi all

I would like to administer a SME 6.0 over the internet.
Somewhere I read that Free/SWAN uses IPSEC and that it is more secure than PPTP.
A lot of people seem to use Free/SWAN.
I was unable to find Free/SWAN for SME 6.0.

Question:
-Should I use PPTP? Is PPTP secure enough or should I go for Free/SWAN and if so where can I find the rpm's for SME 6.0?

[Mike]

Is this a stupid question or hasn't anyone have an answer to this one?

Anyone....

[Lee]

For simply administering the SME itself I just use ssh. I'd say Free/SWAN or PPTP is really for when you want to use the SME as a secure gateway onto the remote LAN.

[DREi]

If you are using the web gui for administration it can come across SSL securely. For command line administration use SSH Putty is a good simple ssh client.

http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/putty/

[Tom Carroll]

Mike, you can look in my contribs section for the Putty How-to.  It will allow you to work from the command line as well as getting access to the server-mananger, phpmyadmin, etc.

Tom

[%sig%]

[Mike]

Hi Guys

Thanks for your reply's.
I think I was incomplete in my Question.
I would like to administer the complete network on the other side, so not only the SME server.
I know putty and use it sometimes.
Because I have my own server at home it is as easy to walk over to it as to use putty.
Also I have someone given permission to log in to the server manager of my own system from over the internet.
This works fine too.
Now I have my first server I have placed somewhere externally and will be reachable through the internet so now I have to start thinking about administration over the internet.
That person is almost the last one in the netherlands that gets an ADSL connection (in a few months).
That also makes it possible to administer the Windows XP clients through the SME server.

The only question that I haven't got answered is if Free/SWAN is more secure as PPTP.
Someone told me that it is possible to break into a PPTP connection but that with for instance L2TP that is almost completely impossible. Free/SWAN (IPSEC) is somewhat comparable with L2TP if I'm correct.
Hope someone knws the difference between Free/SWAN and PPTP and if PPTP is secure enough to administer the complete network on the other side.

[Lloyd Keen]

Mike,
You definitely don't want to go setting up an IPsec tunnel just to administer remote XP workstations on another lan. IPsec allows multiple workstations on one lan to connect to multiple workstations on another lan. PPTP would be the best solution for you needs. When you need to administer the remote XP workstation just VPN into the remote server from your workstation then use something like pcanywhere/vnc or XP's built in Remote Desktop Protocol to connect to and aminister the remote box. I wouldn't be losing any sleep about someone cracking my pptp connection. See http://www.winnetmag.com/Articles/ArticleID/5188/pg/2/2.html for a little light reading.

[Mike]

Thanks Loyd

That article exactly describes the differences and security that I was looking for.
I read the biggest part of it and think that you are right.
IPSEC is the thing you need when you want to connect 2 remote sites together as if it where 1 LAN.
I'll better stick to PPTP.
I think it is exactly the thing I need and it is secure enough for my needs.

Tanks again, Mike