Manual:IP/IPsec

Manual:IP/IPsec
Applies to RouterOS: v5.0 +

Summary
Sub-menu: /ip ipsec
Package required: security
Standards: RFC 4301
Internet Protocol Security (IPsec) is a set of protocols defined by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) to
secure packet exchange over unprotected IP/IPv6 networks such as Internet.
IpSec protocol suite can be divided in following groups:
Authentication Header (AH) RFC 4302
Encapsulating Security Payload (ESP) RFC 4303
Internet Key Exchange (IKE) protocols. Dynamically generates and distributes cryptographic keys for AH and
ESP.

Authentication Header (AH)

AH is a protocol that provides authentication of either all or part of the contents of a datagram through the addition
of a header that is calculated based on the values in the datagram. What parts of the datagram are used for the
calculation, and the placement of the header, depends whether tunnel or transport mode is used.
The presence of the AH header allows to verify the integrity of the message, but doesn't encrypt it. Thus, AH
provides authentication but not privacy (Another protocol ESP is used to provide encryption).
RouterOS supports the following authentication algorithms for AH:
SHA1
MD5

Transport mode
In transport mode AH header is inserted after IP header. IP data and header is used to calculate authentication value.
IP fields that might change during transit, like TTL and hop count, are set to zero values before authentication.

Tunnel mode
In tunnel mode original IP packet is encapsulated within a new IP packet. All of the original IP packet is
authenticated.

Encapsulating Security Payload

Encapsulating Security Payload (ESP) uses shared key encryption to provide data privacy. ESP also supports its own
authentication scheme like that used in AH, or can be used in conjunction with AH.
ESP packages its fields in a very different way than AH. Instead of having just a header, it divides its fields into
three components:

Manual:IP/IPsec
ESP Header - Comes before the encrypted data and its placement depends on whether ESP is used in transport
mode or tunnel mode.
ESP Trailer - This section is placed after the encrypted data. It contains padding that is used to align the
encrypted data.
ESP Authentication Data - This field contains an Integrity Check Value (ICV), computed in a manner similar to
how the AH protocol works, for when ESP's optional authentication feature is used.

Transport mode
In transport mode ESP header is inserted after original IP header. ESP trailer and authentication value is added to the
end of the packet. In this mode only IP payload is encrypted and authenticated, IP header is not secured.

Tunnel mode
In tunnel mode original IP packet is encapsulated within a new IP packet thus securing IP payload and IP header.

Encryption algorithms
RouterOS ESP supports various encryption and authentication algorithms.
Authentication:
SHA1
MD5
Encryption:

DES - 56-bit DES-CBC encryption algorithm;

3DES - 168-bit DES encryption algorithm;
AES - 128, 192 and 256-bit key AES-CBC encryption algorithm;
Blowfish - added since v4.5
Twofish - added since v4.5
Camellia - 128, 192 and 256-bit key Camellia encryption algorithm added since v4.5

Hardware encryption
Hardware encryption allows to do faster encryption process by using built-in encryption engine inside CPU. AES is
the only algorithm that will be accelerated in hardware.
List of RouterBoards with enabled hardware support:
RB1000
RB1100AHx2
For comparison RB1100 with enabled HW support can forward up to 550Mbps encrypted traffic. When HW support
is disabled it can forward only 150Mbps encrypted traffic in AES-128 mode.

Manual:IP/IPsec

Internet Key Exchange Protocol

The Internet Key Exchange (IKE) is a protocol that provides authenticated keying material for Internet Security
Association and Key Management Protocol (ISAKMP) framework. There are other key exchange schemes that work
with ISAKMP, but IKE is the most widely used one. Together they provide means for authentication of hosts and
automatic management of security associations (SA).
Most of the time IKE daemon is doing nothing. There are two possible situations when it is activated:
There is some traffic caught by a policy rule which needs to become encrypted or authenticated, but the policy
doesn't have any SAs. The policy notifies IKE daemon about that, and IKE daemon initiates connection to remote
host. IKE daemon responds to remote connection. In both cases, peers establish connection and execute 2 phases:
Phase 1 - The peers agree upon algorithms they will use in the following IKE messages and authenticate. The
keying material used to derive keys for all SAs and to protect following ISAKMP exchanges between hosts is
generated also.
Phase 2 - The peers establish one or more SAs that will be used by IPsec to encrypt data. All SAs established by
IKE daemon will have lifetime values (either limiting time, after which SA will become invalid, or amount of
data that can be encrypted by this SA, or both).
There are two lifetime values - soft and hard. When SA reaches it's soft lifetime treshold, the IKE daemon receives a
notice and starts another phase 2 exchange to replace this SA with fresh one. If SA reaches hard lifetime, it is
discarded.
IKE can optionally provide a Perfect Forward Secrecy (PFS), which is a property of key exchanges, that, in turn,
means for IKE that compromising the long term phase 1 key will not allow to easily gain access to all IPsec data that
is protected by SAs established through this phase 1. It means an additional keying material is generated for each
phase 2.
Generation of keying material is computationally very expensive. Exempli gratia, the use of modp8192 group can
take several seconds even on very fast computer. It usually takes place once per phase 1 exchange, which happens
only once between any host pair and then is kept for long time. PFS adds this expensive operation also to each phase
2 exchange.

Diffie-Hellman Groups
Diffie-Hellman (DH) key exchange protocol allows two parties without any initial shared secret to create one
securely. The following Modular Exponential (MODP) and Elliptic Curve (EC2N) Diffie-Hellman (also known as
"Oakley") Groups are supported:
Diffie-Hellman Group Name

Reference

Group 1

768 bit MODP group

RFC 2409

Group 2

1024 bits MODP group

RFC 2409

Group 3

EC2N group on GP(2^155) RFC 2409

Group 4

EC2N group on GP(2^185) RFC 2409

Group 5

1536 bits MODP group

RFC 3526

Manual:IP/IPsec

IKE Traffic
To avoid problems with IKE packets hit some SPD rule and require to encrypt it with not yet established SA (that
this packet perhaps is trying to establish), locally originated packets with UDP source port 500 are not processed
with SPD. The same way packets with UDP destination port 500 that are to be delivered locally are not processed in
incoming policy check.

Setup Procedure
To get IPsec to work with automatic keying using IKE-ISAKMP you will have to configure policy, peer and
proposal (optional) entries.
Warning: Ipsec is very sensitive to time changes. If both ends of the IpSec tunnel are not synchronizing time
equally(for example, different NTP servers not updating time with the same timestamp), tunnels will break
and will have to be established again.

Peer configuration
Sub-menu: /ip ipsec peer
Peer configuration settings are used to establish connections between IKE daemons (phase 1 configuration). This
connection then will be used to negotiate keys and algorithms for SAs.
Property

Description

address (IP/IPv6 Prefix; Default: 0.0.0.0/0)

If remote peer's address matches this prefix, then the peer configuration is used in authentication
and establishment of Phase 1. If several peer's addresses match several configuration entries, the
most specific one (i.e. the one with largest netmask) will be used.

auth-method (pre-shared-key |
rsa-signature; Default: pre-shared-key)

Authentication method:

certificate (string; Default: )

Name of a certificate listed in certificate table (signing packets; the certificate must have private
key). Applicable if RSA signature authentication method (auth-method=rsa-signature) is used.

comment (string; Default: )

Short description of the peer.

dh-group (ec2n155 | ec2n185 | modp1024 |

modp1536 | modp2048 | modp3072 | modp4096
| modp6144 | modp768; Default: modp1024)

Diffie-Hellman group (cipher strength)

disabled (yes | no; Default: no)

Whether peer is used to match remote peer's prefix.

dpd-interval (time | disable-dpd; Default:

2m)

Dead peer detection interval. If set to disable-dpd, dead peer detection will not be used.

dpd-maximum-failures (integer: 1..100;

Default: 5)

Maximum count of failures until peer is considered to be dead. Applicable if DPD is enabled.

pre-shared-key - authenticate by a password (secret) string shared between the peers

rsa-signature - authenticate using a pair of RSA certificates

enc-algorithm (3des | aes-128 | aes-192 | Encryption algorithm.

aes-256 | blowfish | camellia-128 | camellia-192
| camellia-256 | des; Default: 3des)
exchange-mode (aggressive | base | main;
Default: main)

Different ISAKMP phase 1 exchange modes according to RFC 2408. Do not use other modes
then main unless you know what you are doing.

generate-policy (yes | no; Default: no)

Allow this peer to establish SA for non-existing policies. Such policies are created dynamically
for the lifetime of SA. Automatic policies allows, for example, to create IPsec secured L2TP
tunnels, or any other setup where remote peer's IP address is not known at the configuration time.

Manual:IP/IPsec

hash-algorithm (md5 | sha1; Default:

md5)

Hashing algorithm. SHA (Secure Hash Algorithm) is stronger, but slower.

lifebytes (Integer: 0..4294967295; Default: Phase 1 lifetime: specifies how much bytes can be transferred before SA is discarded. If set to 0,
0)
SA will not be discarded due to byte count excess.
lifetime (time; Default: 1d)

Phase 1 lifetime: specifies how long the SA will be valid.

my-id-user-fqdn (string; Default: )

By default IP address is used as ID. This parameter replaces ID with specified value. Can be
used, for example, in cases if DNS name as ID is required.

nat-traversal (yes | no; Default: no)

Use Linux NAT-T mechanism to solve IPsec incompatibility with NAT routers inbetween IPsec
peers. This can only be used with ESP protocol (AH is not supported by design, as it signs the
complete packet, including IP header, which is changed by NAT, rendering AH signature
invalid). The method encapsulates IPsec ESP traffic into UDP streams in order to overcome some
minor issues that made ESP incompatible with NAT.

port (integer:0..65535; Default: 500)

Communication port used for ipsec traffic.

proposal-check (claim | exact | obey |

strict; Default: obey)

Phase 2 lifetime check logic:

remote-certificate (string; Default: )

Name of a certificate (listed in certificate table) for authenticating the remote side (validating
packets; no private key required). Applicable if RSA signature authentication method is used

secret (string; Default: )

Secret string (in case pre-shared key authentication is used). If it starts with '0x', it is parsed as a
hexadecimal value

claim - take shortest of proposed and configured lifetimes and notify initiator about it
exact - require lifetimes to be the same
obey - accept whatever is sent by an initiator
strict - if proposed lifetime is longer than the default then reject proposal otherwise accept
proposed lifetime

send-initial-contact (yes | no; Default: Specifies whether to send initial IKE information or wait for remote side.
yes)

Note: IPSec phases information is erased, when /ip ipsec peer configuration is modified on the fly, however
packets are being encrypted/decrypted because of installed-sa (for example remote-peers information is
erased, when peer configuration is modified.

Policy
Sub-menu: /ip ipsec policy
Policy table is used to determine whether security settings should be applied to a packet.
Property

Description

action (discard | encrypt | none; Default:

encrypt)

Specifies what to do with packet matched by the policy.

comment (string; Default: )

Short description of the policy

disabled (yes | no; Default: no)

Whether policy is used to match packets.

dst-address (IP/IPv6 prefix; Default:

0.0.0.0/32)

Destination address to be matched in packets.

none - pass the packet unchanged

discard - drop the packet
encrypt - apply transformations specified in this policy and it's SA

dst-port (integer:0..65535 | any; Default: any) Destination port to be matched in packets. If set to any all ports will be matched

Manual:IP/IPsec

ipsec-protocols (ah | esp; Default: esp)

Specifies what combination of Authentication Header and Encapsulating Security Payload

protocols you want to apply to matched traffic

level (require | unique | use; Default: require)

Specifies what to do if some of the SAs for this policy cannot be found:

use - skip this transform, do not drop packet and do not acquire SA from IKE daemon
require - drop packet and acquire SA
unique - drop packet and acquire a unique SA that is only used with this particular
policy

manual-sa (string | none; Default: none)

Name of the manual SA template

priority (integer:-2147483646..2147483647;
Default: 0)

Policy ordering classificator (signed integer). Larger number means higher priority.

proposal (string; Default: default)

Name of the proposal template that will be sent by IKE daemon to establish SAs for this
policy.

protocol (all | egp | ggp| icmp | igmp | ...;

Default: all)

IP packet protocol to match.

sa-dst-address (ip/ipv6 address; Default: ::)

SA destination IP/IPv6 address (remote peer).

sa-src-address (ip/ipv6 address; Default: ::)

SA source IP/IPv6 address (local peer).

src-address (ip/ipv6 prefix; Default:

0.0.0.0/32)

Source IP prefix

src-port (any | integer:0..65535; Default: any) Source Port of the packet

tunnel (yes | no; Default: no)

Specifies whether to use tunnel mode

Note: All packets are IPIP encapsulated in tunnel mode, and their new IP header's src-address and dst-address
are set to sa-src-address and sa-dst-address values of this policy. If you do not use tunnel mode (id est you use
transport mode), then only packets whose source and destination addresses are the same as sa-src-address and
sa-dst-address can be processed by this policy. Transport mode can only work with packets that originate at
and are destined for IPsec peers (hosts that established security associations). To encrypt traffic between
networks (or a network and a host) you have to use tunnel mode.

Policy Stats
Command /ip ipsec policy print stats will show current status of the policy. Additional read-only
parameters will be printed.
Property

Description

in-accepted (integer)

How many incoming packets were passed by the policy without an attempt to decrypt.

in-dropped (integer)

How many incoming packets were dropped by the policy without an attempt to decrypt

in-transformed (integer)

How many incoming packets were decrypted (ESP) and/or verified (AH) by the policy

out-accepted (integer)

How many outgoing packets were passed by the policy without an attempt to encrypt.

out-dropped (integer)

How many outgoing packets were dropped by the policy without an attempt to encrypt.

out-transformed (integer)

How many outgoing packets were encrypted (ESP) and/or verified (AH) by the policy.

ph2-state (expired | no-phase2 | established) Indication of the progress of key establishing.

Manual:IP/IPsec

Dumping Policies
It is possible to dump policies installed into the kernel for debugging purposes with command:
/ip ipsec policy

dump-kernel-policies

After executing this command check the logs to see the result, there should be three policies in the kernel: forward,
in and out.
[admin@test-host] >/log print
07:28:34 ipsec,debug,packet policy ipsec fwd: 10.5.101.9[0] - 10.5.101.13[0]
07:28:34 ipsec,debug,packet policy ipsec in: 10.5.101.9[0] - 10.5.101.13[0]
07:28:34 ipsec,debug,packet policy ipsec out: 10.5.101.13[0] - 10.5.101.9[0]

Proposal settings
Sub-menu: /ip ipsec proposal
Proposal information that will be sent by IKE daemon to establish SAs for this policy. Configured proposals are set
in policy configuration.
Property

Description

auth-algorithms (md5|sha1|null; Default: sha1)

Allowed algorithms for

authorization. sha1 is stronger, but
slower algorithm.

comment (string; Default: )

Short description of an item.

disabled (yes | no; Default: no)

Whether item is disabled.

enc-algorithms
(null|des|3des|aes-128|aes-192|aes-256|blowfish|camellia-128|camellia-192|camellia-256|twofish; Default:
3des)

Allowed algorithms and key

lengths to use for SAs.

lifetime (time; Default: 30m)

How long to use SA before

throwing it out.

name (string; Default: )

Name of the proposal template,

that will be identified in other
parts of ipsec configuration.

pfs-group (ec2n155 | ec2n185 | modp1024 | modp1536 | modp2048 | modp3072 | modp4096 | modp6144 |

modp768 | none; Default: modp1024)

Diffie-Helman group used for

Perfect Forward Secrecy.

Manual SA
Sub-menu: /ip ipsec manual-sa
Menu is used to configure SAs manually. Created SA template then can be used in policy configuration.

Manual:IP/IPsec

Property

Description

ah-algorithm (in/out
in,out = md5|null|sha1; Default: null)

Authentication Header encryption algorithm.

ah-key (string/string; Default: )

Incoming-authentication-key/outgoing-authentication-key

ah-spi (0x100..FFFFFFFF/0x100..FFFFFFFF; Default: 0x100)

Incoming-SA-SPI/outgoing-SA-SPI

disabled (yes | no; Default: no)

Defines whether item is ignored or used

esp-auth-algorithm (in/out
in,out = md5|null|sha1; Default: null)

Encapsulating Security Payload authentication encryption algorithm

esp-auth-key (string/string; Default: )

Incoming-authentication-key/outgoing -authentication-key

esp-enc-algorithm (in/out
in,out = 3des | aes-128 | aes-192 | aes-256 | des | ...; Default: null)

Incoming-encryption-algorithm

esp-enc-key (string/string; Default: )

Incoming-encryption-key/outgoing-encryption-key

esp-spi (0x100..FFFFFFFF/0x100..FFFFFFFF; Default: 0x100) Incoming-SA-SPI/outgoing-SA-SPI

lifetime (time; Default: 0s)

Lifetime of this SA

name (string; Default: )

Name of the item for reference from policies

Installed SA
Sub-menu: /ip ipsec installed-sa
This facility provides information about installed security associations including the keys.

Flushing SAs
Sometimes after incorrect/incomplete negotiations took place, it is required to flush manually the installed SA table
so that SA could be renegotiated. This option is provided by the /ip ipsec installed-sa flush
command. This command accepts only one property:
Property

Description

sa-type (ah | all | esp; Default: all) Specifies SA types to flush.

ah - delete AH protocol SAs only

esp - delete ESP protocol SAs only
all - delete both ESP and AH protocols SAs

Remote Peers
Sub-menu: /ip ipsec remote-peers
This submenu provides you with various statistics about remote peers that currently have established phase 1
connections with this router. Note that if peer doesn't show up here, it doesn't mean that no IPsec traffic is being
exchanged with it.
Read only properties:

Manual:IP/IPsec

Property

Description

local-address (ip/ipv6
address)

Local ISAKMP SA address on the router used by the peer

remote-address (ip/ipv6
address)

Remote peer's ip/ipv6 address

side (initiator | responder)

Shows which side initiated the Phase1 negotiation.

state (string)

State of phase 1 negotiation with the peer. For example when phase1 and phase 2 are negotiated it will show
state "established".

established (time)

How long peers are in established state.

Closing all IPsec connections

Menu has a command to quickly close all established ipsec connections. This command will clear all installed SAs
(Phase2) and remove all entries from remote-peers menu (Phase1).
Usage:
/ip ipsec remote-peers kill-connections

Statistics
Sub-menu: /ip ipsec statistics
This menu shows various ipsec statistics
Property

Description

in-errors (integer)

All inbound errors that are not matched by other counters.

in-buffer-errors (integer)

No free buffer.

in-header-errors (integer)

Header error

in-no-states (integer)

No state is found i.e. Either inbound SPI, address, or IPsec protocol at SA is wrong

in-state-protocol-errors
(integer)

Transformation protocol specific error, for example SA key is wrong or hardware accelerator is
unable to handle amount of packets.

in-state-mode-errors (integer)

Transformation mode specific error

in-state-sequence-errors
(integer)

Sequence number is out of window

in-state-expired (integer)

State is expired

in-state-mismatches (integer)

State has mismatched option, for example UDP encapsulation type is mismatched.

in-state-invalid (integer)

State is invalid

in-template-mismatches (integer)

No matching template for states, e.g. Inbound SAs are correct but SP rule is wrong

in-no-policies (integer)

No policy is found for states, e.g. Inbound SAs are correct but no SP is found

in-policy-blocked (integer)

Policy discards

in-policy-errors (integer)

Policy errors

out-errors (integer)

All outbound errors that are not matched by other counters

out-bundle-errors (integer)

Bundle generation error

out-bundle-check-errors (integer) Bundle check error

out-no-states (integer)

No state is found

Manual:IP/IPsec

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out-state-protocol-errors
(integer)

Transformation protocol specific error

out-state-mode-errors (integer)

Transformation mode specific error

out-state-sequence-errors
(integer)

Sequence errors, for example Sequence number overflow

out-state-expired (integer)

State is expired

out-policy-blocked (integer)

Policy discards

out-policy-dead (integer)

Policy is dead

out-policy-errors (integer)

Policy error

Application Examples
Site to Site IpSec Tunnel
Consider setup as illustrated below

Two remote office routers are connected to internet and office workstations behind routers are NATed. Each office
has its own local subnet, 10.1.202.0/24 for Office1 and 10.1.101.0/24 for Office2. Both remote offices needs secure
tunnel to local networks behind routers.
IP Connectivity
On both routers ether1 is used as wan port and ether2 is used to connect workstations. Also NAT rules are set tu
masquerade local networks.
Office1 router:
/ip address
add address=192.168.90.1/24 interface=ether1
add address=10.1.202.1/24 interface=ether2
/ip route
add gateway=192.168.90.254

Manual:IP/IPsec

/ip firewall nat

add chain=srcnat out-interface=ether1 action=masquerade
Office2 router:
/ip address
add address=192.168.80.1/24 interface=ether1
add address=10.1.101.1/24 interface=ether2
/ip route
add gateway=192.168.80.254
/ip firewall nat
add chain=srcnat out-interface=ether1 action=masquerade
IpSec Peer's config
Next step is to add peer's configuration. We need to specify peers address and port and pre-shared-key. Other
parameters are left to default values.
Office1 router:
/ip ipsec peer
add address=192.168.80.1/32 port=500 auth-method=pre-shared-key secret="test"
Office2 router:
/ip ipsec peer
add address=192.168.90.1/32 port=500 auth-method=pre-shared-key secret="test"
Policy and proposal
It is important that proposed authentication and encryption algorithms match on both routers. In this example we can
use predefined "default" proposal
[admin@MikroTik] /ip ipsec proposal> print
Flags: X - disabled
0
name="default" auth-algorithms=sha1 enc-algorithms=3des lifetime=30m
pfs-group=modp1024
As we already have proposal as a next step we need correct IpSec policy. We want to encrypt traffic coming form
10.1.202.0/24 to 10.1.101.0/24 and vice versa.
Office1 router:
/ip ipsec policy
add src-address=10.1.202.0/24 src-port=any dst-address=10.1.101.0/24 dst-port=any \
sa-src-address=192.168.90.1 sa-dst-address=192.168.80.1 \
tunnel=yes action=encrypt proposal=default

Office2 router:
/ip ipsec policy
add src-address=10.1.101.0/24 src-port=any dst-address=10.1.202.0/24 dst-port=any \
sa-src-address=192.168.80.1 sa-dst-address=192.168.90.1 \

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Manual:IP/IPsec

12

tunnel=yes action=encrypt proposal=default

Note that we configured tunnel mode instead of transport, as this is site to site encryption.
NAT Bypass
At this point if you will try to establish IpSec tunnel it will not work, packets will be rejected. This is because both
routers have NAT rules that is changing source address after packet is encrypted. Remote router reiceves encrypted
packet but is unable to decrypt it because source address do not match address specified in policy configuration. For
more information see packet flow ipsec example.
To fix this we need to set up NAT bypass rule.
Office1 router:
/ip firewall nat
add chain=srcnat action=accept place-before=0 \
src-address=10.1.202.0/24 dst-address=10.1.101.0/24
Office2 router:
/ip firewall nat
add chain=srcnat action=accept place-before=0 \
src-address=10.1.101.0/24 dst-address=10.1.202.0/24
It is very important that bypass rule is placed at the top of all other NAT rules.
Note: If you previously tried to establish tunnel before NAT bypass rule was added, you have to clear
connection table from existing connection or restart the routers

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Article Sources and Contributors

Article Sources and Contributors

Manual:IP/IPsec Source: http://wiki.mikrotik.com/index.php?oldid=22482 Contributors: Eep, Eugene, Janisk, Marisb, Normis, SacXs2, SergejsB

Image Sources, Licenses and Contributors

Image:Version.png Source: http://wiki.mikrotik.com/index.php?title=File:Version.png License: unknown Contributors: Normis
Image:Icon-warn.png Source: http://wiki.mikrotik.com/index.php?title=File:Icon-warn.png License: unknown Contributors: Marisb, Route
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