Book Image

Troubleshooting OpenVPN

By : Eric F Crist
Book Image

Troubleshooting OpenVPN

By: Eric F Crist

Overview of this book

OpenVPN, the most widely used open source VPN package, allows you to create a secure network across systems, keeping your private data secure. Connectivity and other issues are a pain to deal with, especially if they are impacting your business. This book will help you resolve the issues faced by OpenVPN users and teach the techniques on how to troubleshoot it like a true expert. This book is a one stop solution for troubleshooting any issue related to OpenVPN. We will start by introducing you to troubleshooting techniques such as Packet Sniffing, Log Parsing, and OpenSSL. You will see how to overcome operating system specific errors. Later on, you will get to know about network and routing errors by exploring the concepts of IPv4 and IPv6 networking issues. You will discover how to overcome these issues to improve the performance of your OpenVPN deployment. By the end of the book, you will know the best practices, tips, and tricks to ensure the smooth running of your OpenVPN.
Table of Contents (16 chapters)

Pre-shared keys


Using pre-shared key (PSK) is where OpenVPN started. The static key how-to on the OpenVPN website is often the first place aspiring VPN administrators begin. Problems with PSKs are relatively easy to identify as the VPN will simply fail to operate.

There are two scenarios where PSKs are used, in a static key point-to-point VPN and with the --tls-auth directive in the more commonly deployed client-server topology. This section will specifically cover the prior, static key, scenario. The latter, the --tls-auth scenario, is specifically covered in depth in Chapter 7Network and Routing. The advice listed there equally applies to VPNs using PSKs for the data channel, as well. Pay close attention to --key-direction, if used.