Ports & Security

[JaxChris]

In one of the future releases could there be an option to make GB-PVR work in an "Offline Mode"? I run my system with 0 Open/Listening ports and now GB-PVR has 8 ports going while it's idle or open. Why are those ports left open? Could there be an option to close them up please? It can still open a port whenever you have it set to grab your EPG data, but then close it after.

Feedback on the idea and some discussion would be nice to see on this. Thanks in advance.

[sub]

What ports are you concerned about? All port usage is keep to a minimum, and it generally depends on what feature you try and use.

I'm currently at work and dont have the code in front of me, but from memory:
- The GB-PVR recording service listens permanently on one port for requests from GB-PVR clients. This is the only listening port you cant disable.
- If you enable the web interface, it permanently listens on one more port. Login information is MD5 hashed (with salt value) at the browser, to prevent and snooping of the line. If you dont enable web scheduling it wont listen on this port.
- If you run an MVP server, it needs to listen on a few more ports (Hauppauge BOOTP, Hauppauge TFTP, MVP Service Locator, MVP control, MVP Stream). If you dont need to use an MVP server, then these ports wont be opened.


In terms of out going connections:
- When you listen to a net radio station, it needs to connect to the remote server to stream music. You can disable the netradio plugin if you dont want to connect out.
- Updating the EPG will cause an out going connection if you use bleb or zap2it.
- Plugins may have various ports they need to connect to, to retrieve weather info, comics etc. Again, you can disable these plugins if you dont want them to connect out.

All of these *outgoing* connections should currently be closing at completion of their tasks, but if you think some arn't then let me know the details and I'll take a closer look. Remember, these are out going connections which go to specific places, and arn't listening for incoming connection, so represent minimal risk.

[aegisx]

You can also break out Zone Alarm our another firewall to stop any connections to these ports.