Network Configuration

It’s time to set up the network for your virtual machine.

Linux Settings

Before configuring the underlying networking of the virtual machine, you may want to tweak some settings inside Linux.

In the file /etc/network/interfaces, edit eth0 settings. For example, the virtualbox network:

auto eth0
iface eth0 inet static
address 192.168.56.101
netmask 255.255.255.0
network 192.168.56.0
broadcast 192.168.56.255
gateway 192.168.56.1

Virtual Networking

You need to decide how to make your virtual machine access the Internet or your local network.

In previous releases, Cuckoo used shared folders to exchange data between the host and guests. From release 0.4 on, it uses a custom agent that communicates over the network with a simple XMLRPC protocol.

To make it work properly, configure your machine’s network so that the host and the guest can communicate. To ensure the virtual network was set up correctly, test the network access by pinging a guest. Use only static IP addresses for your guest, as Cuckoo doesn’t support DHCP; using it will break your setup.

This stage depends heavily on your requirements and the characteristics of your virtualization software.

Warning

Virtual networking errors! Virtual networking is a vital component for Cuckoo; be sure there is connectivity between host and guest. Most of the issues reported by users are related to an incorrect networking setup. Check your virtualization software documentation and test connectivity with ping and telnet.

The recommended setup uses a host-only networking layout with proper forwarding and filtering configuration done with iptables on the host.

For example, using VirtualBox, you can enable Internet access to the virtual machines using the following iptables rules: (Assuming that eth0 is your outgoing interface, vboxnet0 is your virtual interface and 192.168.56.0/24 is your subnet address).

iptables -A FORWARD -o eth0 -i vboxnet0 -s 192.168.56.0/24 -m conntrack –ctstate NEW -j ACCEPT iptables -A FORWARD -m conntrack –ctstate ESTABLISHED,RELATED -j ACCEPT iptables -A POSTROUTING -t nat -j MASQUERADE

Add IP forwarding:

sysctl -w net.ipv4.ip_forward=1