How many iptables block rules is too many

Posted by mhost on Server Fault See other posts from Server Fault or by mhost
Published on 2013-10-17T19:00:15Z Indexed on 2013/10/17 21:59 UTC
Read the original article Hit count: 164

Filed under:

iptables

We have a server with a Quad-Core AMD Opteron Processor 2378. It acts as our firewall for several servers. I've been asked to block all IPs from China.

In a separate network, we have some small VPS machines (256MB and 512MB). I've been asked to block china on those VPS's as well.

I've looked online and found lists which requires 4500 block rules. My question is will putting in all 4500 rules be a problem? I know iptables can handle far more rules than that, what I am concerned about is since these are blocks that I don't want to have access to any port, I need to put these rules before any allow. This means all legitimate traffic needs to be compared to all those rules before getting through. Will the traffic be noticeably slower after implementing this? Will those small VPS's be able to handle processing that many rules for every new packet (I'll put an established allow before the blocks)?

My question is not How many rules can iptables support?, its about the effect that these rules will have on load and speed.

Thanks.

Related posts about iptables

Sometimes this script fails to update the iptables

as seen on Server Fault - Search for 'Server Fault'
It does not happen often, but sometimes after running the below script, checking the iptables with service iptables status shows that they weren't updated and the script doesn't output any error. The iptables is structured as look-up tree (long repeated sections snipped): #!/bin/sh iptables -t… >>> More
My current iptable configuration doesn't work [on hold]

as seen on Server Fault - Search for 'Server Fault'
sudo chkconfig iptables off /etc/init.d/iptables on ### Clear/flush iptables sudo iptables -F sudo iptables -P INPUT ACCEPT sudo iptables -P OUTPUT ACCEPT sudo iptables -P FORWARD ACCEPT ### Allow SSH iptables -A INPUT -i eth0 -p tcp --dport 22 -m state --state NEW,ESTABLISHED -j ACCEPT iptables… >>> More
L2TP iptables port forward

as seen on Server Fault - Search for 'Server Fault'
Hi all, I'm setting up port forwarding for an L2TP VPN connection to the local Windows 2003 VPN server. The router is a simpel Debian machine with iptables. The VPN server works perfect. But I cannot log in from the WAN. I'm missing something. The VPN server is using a pre-shared key (L2TP) and… >>> More
iptables -P FORWARD DROP makes port forwarding slow

as seen on Server Fault - Search for 'Server Fault'
I have three computers, linked like this: box1 (ubuntu) box2 router & gateway (debian) box3 (opensuse) [10.0.1.1] ---- [10.0.1.18,10.0.2.18,10.0.3.18] ---- [10.0.3.15] | box4, www [10.0.2.1] Among other… >>> More
IPtables AWS EC2 NAT/Reverse NAT - For Reverse Proxy style setup but with IPtables

as seen on Server Fault - Search for 'Server Fault'
I was thinking initially needing to do a reverse proxy or something so I could get some SSL/TLS traffic look like it is being terminated at a server and IP address in the AWS cloud, and then that traffic is forwarded onto our actual web servers that aren't in the cloud... I've not done much iptables… >>> More

Developer IT