Netgate Discussion Forum
    • Categories
    • Recent
    • Tags
    • Popular
    • Users
    • Search
    • Register
    • Login
    Introducing Netgate Nexus: Multi-Instance Management at Your Fingertips.

    Did pfSense change reject behavior on a recent update?

    Scheduled Pinned Locked Moved Firewalling
    13 Posts 3 Posters 348 Views 4 Watching
    Loading More Posts
    • Oldest to Newest
    • Newest to Oldest
    • Most Votes
    Reply
    • Reply as topic
    Log in to reply
    This topic has been deleted. Only users with topic management privileges can see it.
    • johnpozJ Offline
      johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator @whanlon
      last edited by

      @whanlon let me take a look, I run some rejects on my lan as well.

      An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
      If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
      Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
      SG-4860 25.11.1 | Lab VMs 2.8.1, 25.11.1

      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
      • S Offline
        SteveITS Rebel Alliance @whanlon
        last edited by

        @whanlon they changed how floating match rules work.

        https://docs.netgate.com/pfsense/en/latest/releases/25-11.html#:~:text=Fixed:%20Filter%20rule%20evaluation

        Only install packages for your version, or risk breaking it. Select your branch in System/Update/Update Settings.
        When upgrading, allow 10-15 minutes to reboot, or more depending on packages, CPU, and/or disk speed.
        Upvote 👍 helpful posts!

        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
        • johnpozJ Offline
          johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator @whanlon
          last edited by johnpoz

          @whanlon so now you have me wondering, vs looking through logs for hits on my rejects - I just created a new rule.. And then triggered it.

          And your right the log just shows X (block)... So now trying to recall if before did you use to show the reject hand, etc..

          But I did do a sniff while testing the rule - and did get the icmp notification of being denied, ie reject.

          reject.jpg

          But yeah you would hope the log would show reject vs block, if what is triggering is a reject rule. hmmm - have to look through redmine if has been reported.

          I will also have to fire up my 2.8.1 vm and see what it does.

          An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
          If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
          Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
          SG-4860 25.11.1 | Lab VMs 2.8.1, 25.11.1

          W 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
          • W Offline
            whanlon @johnpoz
            last edited by

            @johnpoz I know that the logs used to mark the rejected packets with the yellow hand. I monitor the logs regularly to ensure I am not preventing outbound traffic that users need. I don't recall what the "rule details" dialog said for "action" though unfortunately. Maybe it is just cosmetic, but the action says "block", not "reject". Perhaps that is an error. I'm not sure.

            @SteveITS I don't have any explicit floating rules set, so I am not sure how it applies to my example. Are there implicit quick rules set that don't show up in the psSense GUI that could cause this behavior?

            johnpozJ 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
            • johnpozJ Offline
              johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator @whanlon
              last edited by

              @whanlon yeah agree, but personally I don't recall for 100% but I do seem to recall in the logs it was hand.. What is weird is showing block but still does send the reject..

              I am about to head out, but when get some time will check with my 2.8.1 vm and look through redmine to see anything there related.

              An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
              If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
              Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
              SG-4860 25.11.1 | Lab VMs 2.8.1, 25.11.1

              W 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
              • W Offline
                whanlon @johnpoz
                last edited by

                @johnpoz I added a block rule below by existing reject rule and took a look at /tmp/rules.debug, which has the current set of rules in effect (https://docs.netgate.com/pfsense/en/latest/firewall/pf-ruleset.html).

                It looks legit. These are the rules that are in place:

                block return  in log  quick  on $VUSER_LAN inet from $OPT4__NETWORK to any ridentifier 1756936730 label "id=1756936730" label "tags=user_rule" label "descr=Reject ALL VUSER_LAN traffic to ANY"
                block  in log  quick  on $VUSER_LAN inet from $OPT4__NETWORK to any ridentifier 1768607449 label "id=1768607449" label "tags=user_rule" label "descr=Block ALL VUSER_LAN traffic to ANY"
                

                My fundamental misunderstanding was that "block return" is the pf rule to "reject". And my screenshot shows that the action is corrected described as "block" and the rule "block reject" is also correctly show in the ruleset dialog. Given that @johnpoz and I both see the correct behavior of how packets are handled, there is no issue with the firewall itself. I do think that there was a cosmetic change though. These rejected packets used to have the yellow hand icon displayed in the action column of the firewall log, but now they have the red "x" like all packets that are blocked WITHOUT returning a RST or ICMP type 3. @johnpoz may be able to verify that with a VM.

                Thanks for the quick replies.

                johnpozJ 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                • johnpozJ Offline
                  johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator @whanlon
                  last edited by

                  @whanlon maybe the return is just cut off in the log now, and so you see the normal block symbol - clearly its just cosmetic it seems if you cut off "block return" and just show block in the action row.. maybe it shows the wrong image is all. The rule there does show return, and does send it.

                  An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
                  If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
                  Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
                  SG-4860 25.11.1 | Lab VMs 2.8.1, 25.11.1

                  1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                  • johnpozJ Offline
                    johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator @whanlon
                    last edited by johnpoz

                    @whanlon ok well its normal in 2.8.1

                    It shows the reject hand in the log, and action is reject - rule is the same "block return" and it does send the reject via icmp just like 25.11 is doing.

                    So yeah clearly it changed.. will have to look through redmine to see if listed.. But yeah it should be put back to showing the little reject hand in the logs.

                    Same test created a rject rule, log it.. send traffic

                    ce-reject.jpg

                    edit: ok I didn't see anything in remine about this, so opened a new issue

                    https://redmine.pfsense.org/issues/16644

                    An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
                    If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
                    Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
                    SG-4860 25.11.1 | Lab VMs 2.8.1, 25.11.1

                    W 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
                    • W Offline
                      whanlon @johnpoz
                      last edited by

                      @johnpoz Thanks for verifying and submitting the bug report.

                      johnpozJ 2 Replies Last reply Reply Quote 0
                      • johnpozJ Offline
                        johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator @whanlon
                        last edited by johnpoz

                        @whanlon np - while it it seems to be only cosmetic, since it does send the reject.. I would think should be a simple fix.. But then again I might be just assuming its easy.. Lets hope it can make it into 25.11.1 or 26.03

                        An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
                        If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
                        Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
                        SG-4860 25.11.1 | Lab VMs 2.8.1, 25.11.1

                        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                        • johnpozJ Offline
                          johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator @whanlon
                          last edited by

                          @whanlon this seems to have been fixed

                          https://redmine.pfsense.org/issues/16644#change-79070

                          An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
                          If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
                          Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
                          SG-4860 25.11.1 | Lab VMs 2.8.1, 25.11.1

                          W 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                          • W Offline
                            whanlon @johnpoz
                            last edited by

                            @johnpoz Cool!

                            1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                            • First post
                              Last post
                            Copyright 2026 Rubicon Communications LLC (Netgate). All rights reserved.