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PfSense 2.5 and AES-NI

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Re: PfSense 2.5 and AES-NI

#41

Post by htilonom »

sharifm wrote: post #23

This may be a good time to try a new relative open source product. OPNSense is a fork of PFSense with some philosophical and practical differences. Here are some notes on what and why https://docs.opnsense.org/fork/thefork.html

Oh yes, OPNsense. Those sure are some philosophical and practical differences. Differences as in:

- code theft - copyright abuse - attempt to steal pfSense trademark in Europe - toxic project members who publicly attack anyone who dares to point out issues (including assault on all major pfSense developers). - hiding serious vulnerabilities - downplaying serious vulnerabilities

Oh yes, that's a very different project. I documented most of it here https://www.reddit.com/r/OPNscam/

Re: PfSense 2.5 and AES-NI

#42

Post by gonzo »

SaltySolomon wrote: post #22
gonzo wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If this was a move to sell more hardware, why wouldn't we make the decision for 2.4 (which is imminent) rather than 2.5, which is based on FreeBSD 12, when 12.0R isn't even scheduled?

Wait, your argument is that isn't a way to sell more hardware is that you will do it later, not now?

If we only allowed people to load pfSense on hw that we sell,or have sold, you would have a point.

Since we don't even attempt same, my point stands.

Re: PfSense 2.5 and AES-NI

#43

Post by gonzo »

dom0 wrote: post #34
feld wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is your definition of cheap? Don't rule out ARM based solutions.

^- While cheap toy SoCs like those found in SBCs do (all?) have NEON, which includes hardware acceleration for SHA1/2 and AES, don't assume good performance. A x86 desktop core is faster in software than those SoCs with hardware. However, the poor I/O capabilities of most/all toy SoCs rule use as a high-bandwidth router out; you can't do Gigabit routing with just one built-in MAC and the other connected to a USB 2.0…

The expressobin board has 3 NICs, runs a dual-core Marvell 3700, which is ARMv8, and has a crypto-offload on the SoC.

It sells for $49 on Amazon. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B06Y3V2FBK

AES-GCM runs quite well on ARMv8:

https://www.rsaconference.com/writable/presentations/file_up...

Re: PfSense 2.5 and AES-NI

#44

Post by stock_toaster »

ktta wrote: post #33

Isn't a linux headless box a great alternative to pfsense for non-commercial use? The problem here seems to be that home users now have to shell out more. If you're going to use OpenVPN and other common software, why not just move to linux side of things? It seems that for home use you wouldn't need any enterprise grade software which I feel is the big advantage of pfSense. Sure pf is great but iptables isn't terribl…

  > I find that the BSDs are becoming increasingly reluctant to  
  > any change that goes against their principles which I  
  > sometimes find a tad misplaced.
This seems a bit uncharitable. pfsense is an open source firewall product, made/released by a company that sells support and services. I wouldn't call it "one of the BSDs" any more than I would call say.. Sophos Firewall or Smoothwall as linux distributions.

Running a properly configured, headless linux box as a firewall would indeed be a fine choice for those technically capable, similarly so would a FreeBSD or OpenBSD install.

Re: PfSense 2.5 and AES-NI

#45

Post by duskwuff »

porjo wrote: post #27
paws wrote: post #10

TL, DR: If you are building a pfSense box with an x86 chip made in the past ~7 years [1], stop reading and carry on. Those of you on a power budget, and want e.g. VPN support at closer to wire speeds, you're being advised to select a CPU with AES-NI to get hardware crypto offload. It's great we have software crypto in the first place, but under load it's likely to put a cap on your max throughput. Kudos to pfSense/Ne…

The Celeron J1900 (released 2013) does not support AES-NI. It's popular in low-powered mini PC devices, many of which come preinstalled with pfSense when purchased from Aliexpress.

Ditto for the Celeron 3215U, which is used in some newer devices along the same lines.

Re: PfSense 2.5 and AES-NI

#46

Post by tptacek »

pinpeliponni wrote: post #37
feld wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, if you care about security AES-NI allegedly prevents a side channel attack.

As long as you keep the keys not in HSM, that'll be true. Should also require the use of TPM for storing keys..

No, this isn't valid reasoning.

Re: PfSense 2.5 and AES-NI

#47

Post by wtallis »

gonzo wrote: post #43
dom0 wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

^- While cheap toy SoCs like those found in SBCs do (all?) have NEON, which includes hardware acceleration for SHA1/2 and AES, don't assume good performance. A x86 desktop core is faster in software than those SoCs with hardware. However, the poor I/O capabilities of most/all toy SoCs rule use as a high-bandwidth router out; you can't do Gigabit routing with just one built-in MAC and the other connected to a USB 2.0…

The expressobin board has 3 NICs, runs a dual-core Marvell 3700, which is ARMv8, and has a crypto-offload on the SoC. It sells for $49 on Amazon. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B06Y3V2FBK AES-GCM runs quite well on ARMv8: https://www.rsaconference.com/writable/presentations/file_up...

That's an interesting board, but it still only has one Ethernet interface, plus an on-board switch.

Re: PfSense 2.5 and AES-NI

#48

Post by jsz0 »

paws wrote: post #10

TL, DR: If you are building a pfSense box with an x86 chip made in the past ~7 years [1], stop reading and carry on. Those of you on a power budget, and want e.g. VPN support at closer to wire speeds, you're being advised to select a CPU with AES-NI to get hardware crypto offload. It's great we have software crypto in the first place, but under load it's likely to put a cap on your max throughput. Kudos to pfSense/Ne…

It's usually not even worth the cost of electricity to keep running hardware that old. Upgrading to modern power efficient hardware pays for itself pretty quickly with lower electrical bills.

Re: PfSense 2.5 and AES-NI

#49

Post by paulmd »

niftich wrote: post #14
paws wrote: post #10

TL, DR: If you are building a pfSense box with an x86 chip made in the past ~7 years [1], stop reading and carry on. Those of you on a power budget, and want e.g. VPN support at closer to wire speeds, you're being advised to select a CPU with AES-NI to get hardware crypto offload. It's great we have software crypto in the first place, but under load it's likely to put a cap on your max throughput. Kudos to pfSense/Ne…

AMD has shipped AES-NI in every processor family starting with Bulldozer in 2011. Intel started in 2010 with Westmere, but kept it out of the lower-end models like Pentium, Celeron, and i3 for several generations. Only since Skylake (2015) is it included in every model produced from a supporting architecture. At least for Intel processors, the generalization above, absent other disclaimers, does not apply. Actual loo…

Not Bobcat, unfortunately - which is what's in the PC Engines APUv1.

Re: PfSense 2.5 and AES-NI

#50

Post by acdha »

givemefive wrote: post #18
gonzo wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If this was a move to sell more hardware, why wouldn't we make the decision for 2.4 (which is imminent) rather than 2.5, which is based on FreeBSD 12, when 12.0R isn't even scheduled?

I don't know. What is your reasoning? I don't really understand why you'd want to force people to upgrade HW when they don't need to.

They spelled out the reasoning in the post:

“in order to support the increased cryptographic loads that we see as part of pfSense verison 2.5, pfSense Community Edition version 2.5 will include a requirement that the CPU supports AES-NI”

You may disagree with that but it's intellectually dishonest to argue as if they didn't provide clear, technically defensible rationale, especially at a time when much of the industry has been moving to hardware offload.

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