Connect externally or FTP?

[krytellan 0]

Hi all. Pretty new to the VPN lifestyle, and I have what is probably a "big" question, and I hope someone can point me in the right direction. I'm a lifetime DIY technology guy, but this has me running in circles.

 

Simply put, I am running an Open VPN client on my Asus RT-AC87U router with AirVPN. I have the Merlin Firmware. I set it all up myself, so I generally "get it". I have a HDD connected to my router that I want to be able to be accessed from anywhere. Just for me, not a business or anyone else. The entire home (mostly) runs on the VPN network. What I want to do is be able to access this HDD from any device or computer when I'm not home.

 

I feel like I should be able to do this simply with the VPN service, but I just cannot gather the knowledge necessary to make it happen. Similarly, I have tried the process of setting up FTP, but I got blocked when I could not get a DDNS service due to the VPN network, and I simply don't talk the right language to interpret all of the different networking forum posts I have come across.

 

Can someone at least point me in the right direction? I would prefer to not have to bother with the FTP and just be able to connect to my network externally.

 

I would appreciate if anyone could take the time to throw me a bone here.

[eburom 16]

 

Hello, I’m not any kind of expert on these issues but I’ll try to help you.

 

First of all, I’m not aware of how to set it up as if all your devices were in the very same private network. That so, I’ll tell you how I’d try to provide secure external access to an HDD of mine.

 

From the accessibility point of view, you need to be able to reach a service in your network from outside. This can be done by forwarding ports through your “Client Area”. You should there find a section called “Forwarded ports” were you can find a box to set up a DDNS to access some port in your client.

The biggest textbox at the top of the main box is for you to chose a port that will be seen from the outside.

Then select the protocol your service works on (TCP & UDP might work).

Optionally you can chose a local port to which the connection will be forwarded (the same as the other by default)

DDNS: a name for you to access this client from the outside. If set, you will be able to access it by (this_name).airdns.org

Press Add.

 

With this done you should be able to access a service of yours from the outside (e.g. your FTP service) but it will be there for everyone else to reach with its security risks.

 

The “drawback” of such setting, if I recall correctly, is that this forwarded port is only guarantied to work if only one client is connected for this account. So you shouldn't connect to your VPN from your external device (at least with the same account).

 

From the security point of view, I suggest you change to a securer protocol such as SFTP. There’s plenty of information on the internet on how to set up a SSH server with public-private key authentication, which I think might be secure enough if properly set up.

 

Hope that helps a bit.

 

Best regards.