Install FreeRADIUS & daloRADIUS on Ubuntu 20.04 + MySQL/MariaDB

FreeRADIUS is a free and open-source implementation of the RADIUS protocol. It’s the most popular and widely deployed open-source RADIUS server, being also used by many Fortune-500 companies, telecommunications companies, and Tier 1 ISPs.

FreeRADIUS most often refers to the RADIUS server, which is just one component of the FreeRADIUS suite. Other components included are:

• BSD-licensed RADIUS client library
• a PAM library
• an Apache RADIUS module
• additional utilities and development libraries related to RADIUS

In this tutorial we’ll install FreeRADIUS on a server running Ubuntu 20.04 and configure it to work with MySQL/MariaDB; we’ll also install daloRADIUS, a RADIUS web management panel, which is basically a FreeRADIUS GUI, and then perform a simple test on the RADIUS server to make sure it works.

Prerequisites

• A server running Ubuntu 20.04, and we recommend a minimum of 512RAM and 300MB storage space.
• Being logged in as a non-root sudo user. This is because when you’re acting as root, you can do anything and the system won’t ask. If you’re not careful you can harm your system, and if you run malicious/buggy applications with root permissions, the application can harm your system. There is good reason why this has been the security model for years.

Assuming you’re on a fresh server running Ubuntu 20.04 install, first we’ll update the server’s package index and upgrade to the latest packages:

sudo apt update
sudo apt upgrade

Install LAMP Stack

The LAMP stack is a group of open-source softwares that can be used to create web applications and websites. LAMP is an acronym for Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP.

Install Apache Web Server

sudo apt -y install apache2

Enable Apache so it starts on boot:

sudo systemctl enable --now apache2

Include Apache’s application profile in UFW’s rules:

sudo ufw allow Apache

Check access to Apache by visiting the server’s IP or hostname ( http://ip_address )

You should see something like this in your browser:

Install PHP & Additional PHP Modules

sudo apt -y install php libapache2-mod-php php-{gd,common,mail,mail-mime,mysql,pear,db,mbstring,xml,curl}

Check PHP version:

php -v

Check if PHP is working

A quick way you can make sure that PHP works, is by creating a simple PHP file in the Apache document root as follows.

Create a file in /var/www/html called phpinfo.php (it can be any name, it doesn’t matter)

sudo nano /var/www/html/phpinfo.php

And add the following line:

Save and close the file.

Now you can visit https://your_server_ip/phpinfo.php and you’ll see something like:

Now remove the file, since it can be used by malicious entities to see information about your server:

sudo rm /var/www/html/phpinfo.php

Install MySQL or MariaDB

MariaDB has been a drop-in replacement for MySQL for years, however there are some differences. From my experience, both work for our purposes, but you still might want to check the differences to make an informed decision. This is an easily skimmable article on the topic – MariaDB vs MySQL: Key Performance Differences.

I typically go with MariaDB, but you can choose whichever you prefer.

MySQL

sudo apt -y install mysql-server

MariaDB

sudo apt -y install mariadb-server

MySQL/MariaDB comes with a script to set up your password to MySQL/MariaDB, as well as altering some less secure values. To start it run the following command:

sudo mysql_secure_installation

You’ll be asked for the current root MySQL password for root:

Enter current password for root (enter for none):

If you followed this tutorial you haven’t set it yet, so go ahead and press Enter. You’ll be asked if you want to set a root password – press Y and Enter and set a new root MySQL password.

Validate Password Plugin

You can skip this section if you’re not prompted by the VALIDATE PASSWORD PLUGIN.

If you install MySQL (and not MariaDB), when you run mysql_secure_installation you may be asked if you want your password validated to make sure it’s strong.

This plugin will ask you to select from 3 levels of password strength to validate from, and depending on what you select your password will be graded and shown to you so you can decide if you want to continue with it or try entering a different one.

VALIDATE PASSWORD PLUGIN can be used to test passwords
and improve security. It checks the strength of password
and allows the users to set only those passwords which are
secure enough. Would you like to setup VALIDATE PASSWORD plugin?

Press y|Y for Yes, any other key for No:

I typically select Y but you can select No if you’re sure of your password.

If you select Y then you’ll be asked to select how strong your password should be.

There are three levels of password validation policy:

LOW Length >= 8
MEDIUM Length >= 8, numeric, mixed case, and special characters
STRONG Length >= 8, numeric, mixed case, special characters and dictionary file

Please enter 0 = LOW, 1 = MEDIUM and 2 = STRONG: 2

In the example I selected 2.

My password contains lowercase letters, uppercase letters, numbers and symbols, and it’s over 8 characters. I get password strength 100 and decide I want to continue so I input Y.

Estimated strength of the password: 100
Do you wish to continue with the password provided?(Press y|Y for Yes, any other key for No) : Y

Next you’ll be asked if you want to remove anonymous users, restrict remote root user access to the local machine, remove test databases, and reload tables. Answer y/leave empty and press enter for Yes to each – unless you have a good reason not to.

Remove anonymous users:

Remove anonymous users? [Y/n] y
... Success!

Disallow root login remotely:

Disallow root login remotely? [Y/n] y
... Success!

Remove the test database:

Remove test database and access to it? [Y/n] y
- Dropping test database...
... Success!
- Removing privileges on test database...
... Success!

Reload privilege tables:

Reload privilege tables now? [Y/n] y
... Success!

Cleaning up...

Now MySQL (or MariaDB) has been installed on your system and we can proceed with configuring FreeRADIUS to use it.

Install FreeRADIUS and Configure with MySQL/MariaDB on Ubuntu 20.04

Install FreeRADIUS along with two modules that FreeRADIUS will need:

• freeradius-mysql – MySQL module for FreeRADIUS, so the server can do accounting and authentication using MySQL.
• freeradius-utils – a module that adds additional useful features to the FreeRADIUS server

sudo apt -y install freeradius freeradius-mysql freeradius-utils -y

Test the FreeRADIUS Server

FreeRADIUS is expected to run well with the default configuration.

To quickly check that FreeRADIUS and up and running we’ll run it in debug mode.

Stop the FreeRADIUS server, as it started automatically after installing it.

sudo systemctl stop freeradius

Run FreeARDIUS in debug mode (remember to use sudo):

sudo freeradius -X

The output should look something like this:

Listening on auth address * port 1812 bound to server default
Listening on acct address * port 1813 bound to server default
Listening on auth address :: port 1812 bound to server default
Listening on acct address :: port 1813 bound to server default
Listening on auth address 127.0.0.1 port 18120 bound to server inner-tunnel
Listening on proxy address * port 52868
Listening on proxy address :: port 57983
Ready to process requests

Stop debug mode by pressing Ctrl+C.

Start and enable FreeRADIUS service so it runs on system boot:

sudo systemctl enable --now freeradius

Allow FreeRADIUS in Firewall

(If you have UFW running on Ubuntu 20.04)

FreeRADIUS uses UDP ports 1812 for authentication and 1813 for accounting. You need to make sure those ports are allowed. The method by which you allow them can also depend on the platform you’re using.

If you’re using UFW, then you can open them by running:

sudo ufw allow to any port 1812 proto udp
sudo ufw allow to any port 1813 proto udp

Configure FreeRADIUS to use MySQL/MariaDB

We’ll create a database and a database user for FreeRADIUS to use.

You can use any credentials you like but make sure to remember to replace the credentials that I’m using with your own, throughout the rest of the tutorial.

The details we’ll use are:

Database: radius
User: radius
Password: Somestrongpassword_321

To begin, access the MySQL/MariaDB console as root, by running the following command and then inputting your password at the prompt:

sudo mysql -u root -p

Create a database and user that will be used by FreeRADIUS:

MariaDB [(none)]> CREATE DATABASE radius;
MariaDB [(none)]> GRANT ALL ON radius.* TO [email protected] IDENTIFIED BY "Somestrongpassword_321";
MariaDB [(none)]> FLUSH PRIVILEGES;
MariaDB [(none)]> quit;

Now to populate the database with the RADIUS MySQL schema.

First we’ll have to switch to using the root user, otherwise we get Access denied when trying to import, even if we’re using sudo:

sudo su -

Now import the RADIUS MySQL schema:

mysql -u root -p radius < /etc/freeradius/3.0/mods-config/sql/main/mysql/schema.sql

Let’s switch back to our non-root user (I’m using edxd so I’ll switch to that):

sudo su - edxd

You can check the tables just created in the radius database by running the following command, and then entering your root MySQL/MariaDB password:

sudo mysql -u root -p -e "use radius;show tables;"

Output:

+------------------+
| Tables_in_radius |
+------------------+
| nas              |
| radacct          |
| radcheck         |
| radgroupcheck    |
| radgroupreply    |
| radpostauth      |
| radreply         |
| radusergroup     |
+------------------+

Create a soft link to the SQL module to /etc/freeradius/3.0/mods-enabled:

sudo ln -s /etc/freeradius/3.0/mods-available/sql /etc/freeradius/3.0/mods-enabled/

Next we configure FreeRADIUS to use SQL. To do this open /etc/freeradius/3.0/mods-enabled/sql using your favorite text editor, so we can edit some parameters.

I’ll install and use nano as my text editor, and open the file:

sudo apt install nano
sudo nano /etc/freeradius/3.0/mods-enabled/sql

There’s quite a bit of text, but most of it is commented out. We’ll just need to edit a few things.

1. Change dialect = "sqlite" to dialect = "mysql"
2. Change driver = "rlm_sql_null" to driver = "rlm_sql_${dialect}"
3. If we use MySQL the FreeRADIUS configuration assumes the use of TLS certs by default. For the purpose of this tutorial we won’t be using TLS certs, so we’ll comment out the MySQL TLS section, by adding a # sign in at the beginning of every line in the tls section.The TLS section looks something like this:

   mysql {
       # If any of the files below are set, TLS encryption is enabled
       tls {
              ca_file = "/etc/ssl/certs/my_ca.crt"
              ca_path = "/etc/ssl/certs/"
              certificate_file = "/etc/ssl/certs/private/client.crt"
              private_key_file = "/etc/ssl/certs/private/client.key"
              cipher = "DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA:AES128-SHA"
   
              tls_required = yes
              tls_check_cert = no
              tls_check_cert_cn = no
       }
   
       # If yes, (or auto and libmysqlclient reports warnings are
       # available), will retrieve and log additional warnings from
       # the server if an error has occured. Defaults to 'auto'
       warnings = auto
   }
   

   And this is how it looks with the tls section commented out:

   mysql {
       # If any of the files below are set, TLS encryption is enabled
       # tls {
       #       ca_file = "/etc/ssl/certs/my_ca.crt"
       #       ca_path = "/etc/ssl/certs/"
       #       certificate_file = "/etc/ssl/certs/private/client.crt"
       #       private_key_file = "/etc/ssl/certs/private/client.key"
       #       cipher = "DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA:AES128-SHA"
   
       #       tls_required = yes
       #       tls_check_cert = no
       #       tls_check_cert_cn = no
       #}
   
       # If yes, (or auto and libmysqlclient reports warnings are
       # available), will retrieve and log additional warnings from
       # the server if an error has occured. Defaults to 'auto'
       warnings = auto
   }
   

4. Next we’ll uncomment the Connection info section and add in the connection details to our MySQL/MariaDB database.First uncomment (remove the # signs) from the beginning of the lines starting with server, port, login, password.

   server – this is the server where the database is located. In this case it’s the local server so we can leave “localhost”
   port – is set to 3306, which is the default port for the classic MySQL protocol. Leave it as is, unless you changed the MySQL port.
   login – this is the database user you created earlier for FreeRADIUS to use. I created the user radius so I’ll leave it as is. You change it if your user is something else.
   password – the password for that MySQL user that you also set earlier.

   This is it’s initial state:

   # Connection info:
   #
   # server = "localhost"
   # port = 3306
   # login = "radius"
   # password = "radpass"

   And here it is edited.

   # Connection info:
   #
   server = "localhost"
   port = 3306
   login = "radius"
   password = "Somestrongpassword_321"

5. A few lines lower we need to configure the name of the database. By default it looks like this:

   # Database table configuration for everything except Oracle
   radius_db = "radius"

   Instead of radius, input the database you created. Since I created the database radius I’ll leave it as is:

   # Database table configuration for everything except Oracle
   radius_db = "radius"

6. Further down we’ll uncomment a line containing read_clients = yes. This is to enable FreeRADIUS to read clients from the database.Here is how it looks:

   # Set to 'yes' to read radius clients from the database ('nas' table)
   # Clients will ONLY be read on server startup.
   # read_clients = yes

   And just remove the # sign to uncomment it:

   # Set to 'yes' to read radius clients from the database ('nas' table)
   # Clients will ONLY be read on server startup.
   read_clients = yes

7. Just a few lines lower, we want client_table = “nas” to be uncommented. It should be uncommented by default, but just check to make sure it looks like this:

# Table to keep radius client info
client_table = "nas"

Now change the group rights of the file we just edited:

sudo chgrp -h freerad /etc/freeradius/3.0/mods-available/sql
sudo chown -R freerad:freerad /etc/freeradius/3.0/mods-enabled/sql

And restart the FreeRADIUS service:

sudo systemctl restart freeradius.service

Since we’ve done quite a few edits, we should run FreeRADIUS in debug mode so we know if we made any mistake, before going further.

First stop the FreeRADIUS service since we can’t have 2 instances of the service running simultaneously:

sudo systemctl stop freeradius.service

And run FreeRADIUS in debug mode:

sudo freeradius -X

The output looks something like this:

Listening on auth address * port 1812 bound to server default
Listening on acct address * port 1813 bound to server default
Listening on auth address :: port 1812 bound to server default
Listening on acct address :: port 1813 bound to server default
Listening on auth address 127.0.0.1 port 18120 bound to server inner-tunnel
Listening on proxy address * port 52025
Listening on proxy address :: port 42807
Ready to process requests

Exit debug mode by pressing Ctrl+C and then start FreeRADIUS again by running:

sudo systemctl start freeradius.service

Now FreeRADIUS is installed on your Ubuntu 20.04 machine and is configured to work with MySQL or MariaDB.

Next we’ll install daloRADIUS, which is a web control panel to manage our FreeRADIUS server. This step is optional, for those who want a GUI for their FreeRADIUS server.

Install & Configure daloRADIUS (FreeRADIUS GUI) on Ubuntu 20.04 (Optional)

First we’ll download daloRADIUS from the Github repository.

I’ll use wget to download it, so I’ll have to install it since it’s not installed by default, and unzip since we’ll be downloading a .zip file:

sudo apt -y install wget unzip

Now download daloRADIUS and cd into the newly created daloradius-master folder:

wget https://github.com/lirantal/daloradius/archive/master.zip
unzip master.zip
cd daloradius-master

Populate the database with the daloRADIUS schema:

sudo mysql -u root -p radius < contrib/db/fr2-mysql-daloradius-and-freeradius.sql
sudo mysql -u root -p radius < contrib/db/mysql-daloradius.sql

cd out of the daloradius-master directory, and move the folder into the document root as daloradius:

cd ..
sudo mv daloradius-master /var/www/html/daloradius

Next we’ll change the owner and group for the daloradius folder to www-data:www-data, which are the user and group under which the Apache Web Server runs.

sudo chown -R www-data:www-data /var/www/html/daloradius/

Now we’ll need to create the daloRADIUS configuration file. Right now we’re just provided a sample file, so we’ll make a copy from that sample file:

sudo cp /var/www/html/daloradius/library/daloradius.conf.php.sample /var/www/html/daloradius/library/daloradius.conf.php

We’ll also change the permissions for the daloRADIUS configuration file:

sudo chmod 664 /var/www/html/daloradius/library/daloradius.conf.php

Next we edit a few variables in the daloRADIUS connection file, so it’s able to connect to the FreeRADIUS database.

Open the configuration file using your favorite editor:

sudo nano /var/www/html/daloradius/library/daloradius.conf.php

Similarly to what we’ve done earlier, when editing the FreeRADIUS config file, we just need to adjust the variables for the database user, their password, and the database name. Those are all the edits for the scope of this tutorial.

This is how they initially look in the daloRADIUS configuration file:

$configValues['CONFIG_DB_USER'] = 'root';
$configValues['CONFIG_DB_PASS'] = '';
$configValues['CONFIG_DB_NAME'] = 'radius';

This is how it looks after editing with the details for the database I created earlier:

$configValues['CONFIG_DB_USER'] = 'radius';
$configValues['CONFIG_DB_PASS'] = 'Somestrongpassword_321';
$configValues['CONFIG_DB_NAME'] = 'radius'

Lastly restart FreeRADIUS and Apache to make sure everything works:

sudo systemctl restart freeradius.service apache2

Access daloRADIUS

You can access daloRADIUS through a web browser by visiting:
http://server_ip_address/daloradius

Make sure it’s http:// and that your browser doesn’t automatically change it to https:// because you may not be able to access daloRADIUS since we haven’t configured it to use SSL.

The daloRADIUS start page looks something like this:

Default daloRADIUS username/password:

username: administrator
password: radius

Change daloRADIUS username & password

Having default credentials such as administrator/radius is a security vulnerability, and there are bots that scan absolutely all IPs and try known default credentials for certain software.

In this manner someone can be scanning all of the possible IPs and they’re trying to detect if daloRADIUS is installed by visiting http://random_ip/daloradius and they’ll try out to log in using administrator/radius, and chances are they’ll succeed some of the time because some people don’t change their default credentials.

You can change a user password by logging into daloRADIUS > Config (In the top menu) > Operators (In the submenu) > List Operators (In the gray sidebar) > Click on user (in our case administrator) and in the next screen change the password and click Apply.

[Video] Change daloRADIUS Administrator Password

To create a new daloRADIUS user (called Operator) go to Config > Operators (in the submenu) > New Operator (in the gray sidebar) > input Operator Username and Operator Password and click Apply.

[Video] Create New daloRADIUS Operator

To get acquainted with daloRADIOUS, next we’ll create a NAS Client Table and a user, and then we’ll test if everything works correctly by sending an Authentication Request using a software called NTRadPing.

Testing FreeRADIUS & daloRADIUS

For the last part of this tutorial we’ll test our FreeRADIUS server and the daloRADIUS web panel.

In short, we’ll send an Authentication Request from another computer to our server to see if it works.

To do this we’ll need to add a NAS (explanation below), a User, and another computer from where to send the request (this can be your computer, for example).

Note: For this demo you’ll need to install a Windows software, called NTRadPing.

1. Creating a NAS Client Table in daloRADIUS

For another computer to use our RADIUS server, it first needs to be added to the NAS Client Table.

The Network Access Server (NAS) client table acts as a gateway that guards a protected resource. For another computer to connect to our RADIUS server, it needs to be added to the NAS client table.

The NAS is an intermediary that a client connects to, then the NAS asks the resource (in our case the RADIUS server) if the credentials are valid, and based on this the NAS will allow or disallow access to the protected resource.

You can read a bit more about the NAS on this page from the FreeRADIUS wiki.

To add a NAS, go in the daloRADIUS dashboard, Management > NAS (in the blue submenu) > New NAS (in the left, dark gray, sidebar).

NAS IP/Host: the IP or fully qualified hostname from which you’re trying to connect
NAS Secret: a password for connecting to the NAS, but it’s referred to as a secret. It’s used to communicate between the client/NAS and RADIUS server.
NAS Type: There are a few types that are recognized, including livingston, cisco, portslave. This is passed to the external checklogin program when it is called to detect double logins. For the purposes of this tutorial we’ll select other.
NAS Shortname: An alias that can be used in place of the IP address or fully qualified hostname provided under NAS IP/Host

For our example we’ll fill in:

NAS IP/Host: IP of another computer we’re using as a client
NAS Secret: nobodywilleverlearnthissecret!!11!!
NAS Type: other
NAS Shortname: ProductionServer

2. Creating a User in daloRADIUS

To test our RADIUS server we’ll also need to have a user.

We can easily create one by navigating in the top menu to Management > Users (in the blue submenu) >New User (in the left, dark gray, sidebar)

For our example all we need is a Username and Password. There are other attributes, but these will be enough for our purposes.

I’ll fill in the following:

Username: new_customer
Password: customer_strong_passwd_123

3. Run FreeRADIUS in Debug Mode

We want to see for ourselves what’s happening on the server, so we’ll run FreeRADIUS in debug mode.

First stop the running process:

sudo systemctl stop freeradius.service

And run the following command to run FreeRADIUS debug mode:

sudo freeradius -X

Now we’re ready to test the server.

4. Test daloRADIUS with NTRadPing

For convenience, we’ll test the server using a free software for Windows, called NTRadPing.

You can download it here https://community.microfocus.com/t5/OES-Tips-Information/NTRadPing-1-5-RADIUS-Test-Utility/ta-p/1777768. This is a direct link to the archive https://community.microfocus.com/dcvta86296/attachments/dcvta86296/OES_Tips/148/1/ntradping.zip

To run it just unzip the archive and run the executable.

This is how it looks like and how we’ll fill in the details in NTRadPing. We’ll use it to send an Authentication Request to the RADIUS server while it’s running in debug mode, so we can see first hand how it accepts the request.

We’ve filled the fields as follows:

RADIUS Server/port: IP of the server we have FreeRADIUS installed on / port 1812
Reply timeout (sec.): 1
Retries: 1
RADIUS Secret key: nobodywilleverlearnthissecret!!11!!
User-Name: new_customer
Password: customer_strong_passwd_123

Lastly check the CHAP checkbox. This is so the request is made using a CHAP password, instead of the default PAP password.

Now you can test the RADIUS server. Just click Send in NTRadPing and if you get an Access-Accept response we can assume it’s working.

The output in NTRadPing should look something like this:

Sending authentication request to server 40.76.122.52:1812
transmiting Packet, code=1 id=3 length=53
recieved response from the server in 16 milliseconds
replay packet code=2 id=3 length=20
response: Access-Accept
-------------------attribute dump------------------

And the output in the terminal, where you’re running FreeRADIUS in debug mode should end with something like this:

...
(2) Sent Access-Accept Id 7 from 10.0.2.4:1812 to 213.136.66.127:52163 length 0
(2) Finished request
Waking up in 4.9 seconds.
(2) Cleaning up request packet ID 7 with timestamp +67
Ready to process requests

Conclusion

Well done. Hopefully you successfully installed FreeRADIUS with MySQL or MariaDB, along with daloRADIUS, on your Ubuntu 20.04 machine.

If you’ve encountered any issues then don’t hesitate to contact us in the comment section, email, or on social media, and we’ll try to assist as soon as possible.

Frequent Errors

“Failed binding with auth address […]” when running in debug mode

Failed binding to auth address * port 1812 bound to server default: Address already in use
/etc/freeradius/3.0/sites-enabled/default[59]: Error binding to port for 0.0.0.0 port 1812

If you get the following error when running FreeRADIUS in debug mode, it most likely means that the FreeRADIUS service is already running and you need to stop it first.

$ sudo systemctl stop freeradius.service