Limiting Access To the Piranha Configuration Tool

The Piranha Configuration Tool prompts for a valid username and password combination. However, because all of the data passed to the Piranha Configuration Tool is in clear-text, it is recommended that you restrict access to trusted networks or only to the local machine.

The easiest way to restrict access is to use Apache's built in access control mechanisms by editing /etc/sysconfig/ha/web/secure/.htaccess. After altering the file you do not have to restart the piranha-gui service because the server checks the .htaccess file each time it accesses the directory.

By default, the access controls for this directory allow anyone to view the contents of the directory. Here is what the default access looks like:

Order deny,allow
Allow from all

To limit access to the Piranha Configuration Tool to only the localhost change the .htaccess file to allow access from only the loopback device (127.0.0.1). For more information on the loopback device, see the chapter titled Network Scripts in the Official Red Hat Linux Reference Guide.

Order deny,allow
Deny from all
Allow from 127.0.0.1

You can also allow specific hosts or subnets as in this example:

Order deny,allow
Deny from all
Allow from 192.168.1.100
Allow from 172.16.57

In the above example, only Web browsers from the machine with the IP address of 192.168.1.100 and machines on the 172.16.57/24 network can access the Piranha Configuration Tool.

	Caution
	Editing this file limits access to the configuration pages in /etc/sysconfig/ha/web/secure/ directory but not to the login and the help pages in /etc/sysconfig/ha/web/. To limit access to this directory, create a .htaccess file in the /etc/sysconfig/ha/web/ with order, allow, and deny lines identical to /etc/sysconfig/ha/web/secure/.htaccess.