Table Of Contents
Management Plane Protection
Contents
Prerequisites for Management Plane Protection
Restrictions for Management Plane Protection
Information About Management Plane Protection
In-Band Management Interface
Control Plane Protection Overview
Management Plane
Management Plane Protection Feature
Benefits of the Management Plane Protection Feature
How to Configure a Device for Management Plane Protection
Configuring a Device for Management Plane Protection
Prerequisites
Examples
Configuration Examples for Management Plane Protection
Configuring Management Plane Protection on Gigabit Ethernet Interfaces: Example
Additional References
Related Documents
Standards
MIBs
RFCs
Technical Assistance
Command Reference
Feature Information for Management Plane Protection
Management Plane Protection
First Published: February 27, 2006
Last Updated: February 27, 2006
The Management Plane Protection (MPP) feature in Cisco IOS software provides the capability to restrict the interfaces on which network management packets are allowed to enter a device. The MPP feature allows a network operator to designate one or more router interfaces as management interfaces. Device management traffic is permitted to enter a device only through these management interfaces. After MPP is enabled, no interfaces except designated management interfaces will accept network management traffic destined to the device.
Restricting management packets to designated interfaces provides greater control over management of a device, providing more security for that device. Other benefits include improved performance for data packets on nonmanagement interfaces, support for network scalability, need for fewer access control lists (ACLs) to restrict access to a device, and management packet floods on switching and routing interfaces are prevented from reaching the CPU.
Finding Feature Information in This Module
Your Cisco IOS software release may not support all of the features documented in this module. To reach links to specific feature documentation in this module and to see a list of the releases in which each feature is supported, use the "Feature Information for Management Plane Protection" section.
Finding Support Information for Platforms and Cisco IOS Software Images
Use Cisco Feature Navigator to find information about platform support and Cisco IOS software image support. Access Cisco Feature Navigator at //www.cisco.com/go/fn. You must have an account on Cisco.com. If you do not have an account or have forgotten your username or password, click Cancel at the login dialog box and follow the instructions that appear.
Contents
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Prerequisites for Management Plane Protection
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Restrictions for Management Plane Protection
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Information About Management Plane Protection
Before you enable the Management Plane Protection feature, you should understand the following concepts:
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In-Band Management Interface
An in-band management interface is a Cisco IOS physical or logical interface that processes management as well as data-forwarding packets. Loopback interfaces commonly are used as the primary port for network management packets. External applications communicating with a networking device direct network management requests to the loopback port. An in-band management interface is also called a shared management interface.
Control Plane Protection Overview
A control plane is a collection of processes that run at the process level on a route processor and collectively provide high-level control for most Cisco IOS software functions. All traffic directly or indirectly destined to a router is handled by the control plane.
Control Plane Policing (CoPP) is a Cisco IOS control-plane feature that offers rate limiting of all control-plane traffic. CoPP allows you to configure a quality of service (QoS) filter that manages the traffic flow of control plane packets. This QoS filter helps to protect the control plane of Cisco IOS routers and switches against denial-of-service (DoS) attacks and helps to maintain packet forwarding and protocol states during an attack or during heavy traffic loads.
Control Plane Protection is a framework that encompasses all policing and protection features in the control plane. The Control Plane Protection feature extends the policing functionality of the CoPP feature by allowing finer policing granularity. Control Plane Protection also includes a traffic classifier, which intercepts control-plane traffic and classifies it in control-plane categories. Management Plane Protection operates within the Control Plane Protection infrastructure.
For more information about the Control Plane Policing feature in Cisco IOS software, see //www.cisco.com/univercd/cc/td/doc/product/software/ios122s/122snwft/release/122s18/gtrtlimt.htm.
For more information about the Control Plane Protection feature in Cisco IOS software, see //www.cisco.com/univercd/cc/td/doc/product/software/ios124/124newft/124t/124t4/htcpp.htm.
Management Plane
The management plane is the logical path of all traffic related to the management of a routing platform. One of three planes in a communication architecture that is structured in layers and planes, the management plane performs management functions for a network and coordinates functions among all the planes (management, control, data). The management plane also is used to manage a device through its connection to the network.
Examples of protocols processed in the management plane are Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP), Telnet, HTTP, Secure HTTP (HTTPS), and SSH. These management protocols are used for monitoring and for CLI access. Restricting access to devices to internal sources (trusted networks) is critical.
Management Plane Protection Feature
The MPP feature in Cisco IOS software provides the capability to restrict the interfaces on which network management packets are allowed to enter a device. The MPP feature allows a network operator to designate one or more router interfaces as management interfaces. Device management traffic is permitted to enter a device through these management interfaces. After MPP is enabled, no interfaces except designated management interfaces will accept network management traffic destined to the device. Restricting management packets to designated interfaces provides greater control over management of a device.
The MPP feature is disabled by default. When you enable the feature, you must designate one or more interfaces as management interfaces and configure the management protocols that will be allowed on those interfaces. The feature does not provide a default management interface. Using a single CLI command, you can configure, modify, or delete a management interface.When you configure a management interface, no interfaces except that management interface will accept network management packets destined to the device. When the last configured interface is deleted, the feature turns itself off.
Following are the management protocols that the MPP feature supports. These management protocols are also the only protocols affected when MPP is enabled.
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Cisco IOS features enabled on management interfaces remain available when the MPP feature is enabled. Nonmanagement packets such as routing and Address Resolution Protocol (ARP) messages for in-band management interfaces are not affected.
This feature generates a syslog for the following events:
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For example, a failure will occur when the management interface cannot successfully receive or process packets destined for the control plane for reasons other than resource exhaustion.
Benefits of the Management Plane Protection Feature
Implementing the MPP feature provides the following benefits:
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How to Configure a Device for Management Plane Protection
This section contains the following task:
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Configuring a Device for Management Plane Protection
Perform this task to configure a device that you have just added to your network or a device already operating in your network. This task shows how to configure MPP where SSH and SNMP are allowed to access the router only through the FastEthernet 0/0 interface.
Prerequisites
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SUMMARY STEPS
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DETAILED STEPS
Step 1 | enable Example: Router> enable | Enables privileged EXEC mode. • |
Step 2 | configure terminal Example: Router# configure terminal | Enters global configuration mode. |
Step 3 | control-plane host Example: Router(config)# control-plane host | Enters control-plane host configuration mode. |
Step 4 | management-interface interface allow protocols Example: Router(config-cp-host)# management-interface FastEthernet 0/0 allow ssh snmp | Configures an interface to be a management interface, which will accept management protocols, and specifies which management protocols are allowed. interface—Name of the interface that you are designating as a management interface. protocols—Management protocols you want to allow on the designated management interface. • • • • • • • • |
Step 5 | Ctrl z Example: Router(config-cp-host)# Ctrl z | Returns to privileged EXEC mode. |
Step 6 | show management-interface [interface | protocol protocol-name] Example: Router# show management-interface FastEthernet 0/0 | Displays information about the management interface such as type of interface, protocols enabled on the interface, and number of packets dropped and processed. interface—(Optional) Interface for which you want to view information. protocol—(Optional) Indicates that a protocol is specified. protocol-name—(Optional) Protocol for which you want to view information |
Examples
The configuration in this example shows MPP configured to allow SSH and SNMP to access the router only through the FastEthernet 0/0 interface. This configuration results in all protocols in the remaining subset of supported management protocols to be dropped on all interfaces unless explicitly permitted. BEEP, FTP, HTTP, HTTPS, Telnet, and TFTP will not be permitted to access the router through any interfaces, including FastEthernet 0/0. Additionally, SNMP and SSH will be dropped on all interfaces except FastEthernet 0/0, where it is explicitly allowed.
To allow other supported management protocols to access the router, you must explicitly allow these protocols by adding them to the protocol list for the FastEthernet 0/0 interface or enabling additional management interfaces and protocols.
Router# configure terminal
Enter configuration commands, one per line. End with CNTL/Z.
Router(config)# control-plane host
Router(config-cp-host)# management-interface FastEthernet 0/0 allow ssh snmp
.Aug 2 15:25:32.846: %CP-5-FEATURE: Management-Interface feature enabled on Control plane host path
The following is output from the show management-interface command issued after configuring MPP in the previous example. The show management-interface command is useful for verifying your configuration.
Router# show management-interface
Management interface FastEthernet0/0
Protocol Packets processed
Configuration Examples for Management Plane Protection
This section provides the following configuration example:
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Configuring Management Plane Protection on Gigabit Ethernet Interfaces: Example
The following example shows how to configure MPP where only SSH, SNMP, and HTTP are allowed to access the router through the Gigabit Ethernet 0/3 interface and only HTTP is allowed to access the router through the Gigabit Ethernet 0/2 interface.
Router# configure terminal
Enter configuration commands, one per line. End with CNTL/Z.
Router(config)# control-plane host
Router(config-cp-host)# management-interface GigabitEthernet 0/3 allow http ssh snmp
.Aug 2 17:00:24.511: %CP-5-FEATURE: Management-Interface feature enabled on Control plane host path
Router(config-cp-host)# management-interface GigabitEthernet 0/2 allow http
The following is output from the show management-interface command issued after configuring MPP in the previous example. The show management-interface command is useful for verifying your configuration.
Router# show management-interface
Management interface GigabitEthernet0/2
Protocol Packets processed
Management interface GigabitEthernet0/3
Protocol Packets processed
Additional References
The following sections provide references related to Management Plane Protection.
Related Documents
Standards
No new or modified standards are supported by this feature, and support for existing standards has not been modified by this feature. | — |
MIBs
No new or modified MIBs are supported by this feature, and support for existing MIBs has not been modified by this feature. | To locate and download MIBs for selected platforms, Cisco IOS releases, and feature sets, use Cisco MIB Locator found at the following URL: //www.cisco.com/go/mibs |
RFCs
RFC 3871 | Operational Security Requirements for Large Internet Service Provider (ISP) IP Network Infrastructure |
Technical Assistance
The Cisco Technical Support and Documentation website contains thousands of pages of searchable technical content, including links to products, technologies, solutions, technical tips, and tools. Registered Cisco.com users can log in from this page to access even more content. | //www.cisco.com/techsupport |
Command Reference
The following commands are introduced or modified in the feature or features
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For information about these commands, see the Cisco IOS Security Command Reference at
//www.cisco.com/en/US/docs/ios/security/command/reference/sec_book.html.
For information about all Cisco IOS commands, see the Command Lookup Tool at
//tools.cisco.com/Support/CLILookup or the Master Command List.
Feature Information for Management Plane Protection
Table 1 lists the release history for this feature.
Not all commands may be available in your Cisco IOS software release. For release information about a specific command, see the command reference documentation.
Cisco IOS software images are specific to a Cisco IOS software release, a feature set, and a platform. Use Cisco Feature Navigator to find information about platform support and Cisco IOS software image support. Access Cisco Feature Navigator at //www.cisco.com/go/fn. You must have an account on Cisco.com. If you do not have an account or have forgotten your username or password, click Cancel at the login dialog box and follow the instructions that appear.
Note
Table 1 Feature Information for Management Plane Protection
Management Plane Protection | 12.4(6)T | Provides the capability to restrict the interfaces on which network management packets are allowed to enter a device. |
Any Internet Protocol (IP) addresses used in this document are not intended to be actual addresses. Any examples, command display output, and figures included in the document are shown for illustrative purposes only. Any use of actual IP addresses in illustrative content is
unintentional and coincidental.
© 2007 Cisco Systems, Inc. All rights reserved.