How to allow local LAN access while connected to Cisco VPN?

Question

How can I maintain local LAN access while connected to Cisco VPN?

When connecting using Cisco VPN, the server has to ability to instruct the client to prevent local LAN access.

Assuming this server-side option cannot be turned off, how can allow local LAN access while connected with a Cisco VPN client?

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I used to think it was simply a matter of routes being added that capture LAN traffic with a higher metric, for example:

  Network 
Destination      Netmask        Gateway       Interface  Metric
   10.0.0.0  255.255.0.0       10.0.0.3        10.0.0.3      20  <--Local LAN
   10.0.0.0  255.255.0.0  192.168.199.1  192.168.199.12       1  <--VPN Link

And trying to delete the 10.0.x.x -> 192.168.199.12 route don't have any effect:

>route delete 10.0.0.0
>route delete 10.0.0.0 mask 255.255.0.0
>route delete 10.0.0.0 mask 255.255.0.0 192.168.199.1
>route delete 10.0.0.0 mask 255.255.0.0 192.168.199.1 if 192.168.199.12
>route delete 10.0.0.0 mask 255.255.0.0 192.168.199.1 if 0x3

And while it still might simply be a routing issue, attempts to add or delete routes fail.

At what level is Cisco VPN client driver doing what in the networking stack that takes overrides a local administrator's ability to administer their machine?

The Cisco VPN client cannot be employing magic. It's still software running on my computer. What mechanism is it using to interfere with my machine's network? What happens when an IP/ICMP packet arrives on the network? Where in the networking stack is the packet getting eaten?

See also

• No internet connection with Cisco VPN
• Cisco VPN Client interrupts connectivity to my LDAP server
• Cisco VPN stops Windows 7 Browsing
• How can I prohibit the creation of a route in Windows XP upon connection to Cisco VPN?
• Rerouting local LAN and Internet traffic when in VPN
• VPN Client "Allow local LAN Access"
• Allow Local LAN Access for VPN Clients on the VPN 3000 Concentrator Configuration Example
• LAN access gone when I connect to VPN
• Windows XP Documentation: Route

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Edit: Things I've not yet tried:

>route delete 10.0.*

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Update: Since Cisco has abandoned their old client, in favor of AnyConnect (HTTP SSL based VPN), this question, unsolved, can be left as a relic of history.

Going forward, we can try to solve the same problem with their new client.

Answer 1

This is VERY convoluted, but if you create a minimal VM using VMWare Player or similar, and run the Cisco AnyConnect VPN client in that, it might be possible to set up routing as you want using the VMWare virtual network adapters, or simply use the VM for access to whatever resources are required via the Cisco SSL VPN and "drag/drop" files to/from your actual machine.

Answer 2

The problem with Anyconnect is that it first modifies the routing table, then babysits it and fixes it up should you modify it manually. I found a workaround for this. Works with version 3.1.00495. May work with other versions, at least similar idea should work assuming the code does not get rewritten. Fortunately for us Cisco has put the babysitter "baby is awake" call into a shared library. So the idea is that we prevent action by vpnagentd via LD_PRELOAD.

1. First we create a file hack.c:

   int _ZN27CInterfaceRouteMonitorLinux20routeCallbackHandlerEv()
   {
     return 0;
   }
   

2. Then compile it like this:

   gcc -o libhack.so -shared -fPIC libhack.c
   

3. Install libhack.so into the Cisco library path:

   sudo cp libhack.so  /opt/cisco/anyconnect/lib/
   

4. Bring down the agent:

   /etc/init.d/vpnagentd stop
   

5. Make sure it really is down

   ps auxw | grep vpnagentd
   

   If not, kill -9 just to be sure.

6. Then fix up /etc/init.d/vpnagentd by adding LD_PRELOAD=/opt/cisco/anyconnect/lib/libhack.so where the vpnagentd is being invoked so it looks like this:

   LD_PRELOAD=/opt/cisco/anyconnect/lib/libhack.so /opt/cisco/anyconnect/bin/vpnagentd
   

7. Now start the agent:

   /etc/init.d/vpnagentd start
   

8. Fix up iptables, because AnyConnect messes with them:

   iptables-save | grep -v DROP | iptables-restore
   

   You may want to do something more advanced here to allow access only to certain LAN hosts.

9. Now fix up the routes as you please, for example:

   route add -net 192.168.1.0 netmask 255.255.255.0 dev wlan0
   

10. Check to see if they are really there:

    route -n
    

The only side effect that I've observed so far is that vpnagentd is using 100% of CPU as reported by top, but overall CPU is only 3% user and 20% system, and the system is perfectly responsive. I straced it, it seems to be doing two selects in a loop when idle returning from both quickly, but it never reads or writes - I suppose the call that I cut out with LD_PRELOAD was supposed to read. There might be a cleaner way to do it, but it is good enough for me so far. If somebody has a better solution, please share.

If something does not work, do gdb -p $(pidof vpnagentd), once attached:

b socket
c
bt

and see which call you are in. Then just guess which one you want to cut out, add it to hack.c and recompile.

Answer 3

My company still uses that vpn. The vpnc client simply changes you iptables settings that way :

# iptables-save
# Generated by iptables-save v1.4.10 on Sun Jun 17 14:12:20 2012
*filter
:INPUT DROP [0:0]
:FORWARD ACCEPT [0:0]
:OUTPUT DROP [0:0]
-A INPUT -s 123.244.255.254/32 -d 192.168.0.14/32 -j ACCEPT 
-A INPUT -i tun0 -j ACCEPT 
-A INPUT -i lo0 -j ACCEPT
-A INPUT -j DROP 
-A OUTPUT -s 192.168.0.14/32 -d 123.244.255.254/32 -j ACCEPT 
-A OUTPUT -o tun0 -j ACCEPT 
-A OUTPUT -o lo0 -j ACCEPT 
-A OUTPUT -j DROP 
COMMIT

It filters all except for the vpn traffic.

Simply get the filter in a file with iptables-save, add INPUT and OUTPOUT access lines that match your needs and reapply the file with iptables-restore.

for instance to access a local network on 192.168.0

# Generated by iptables-save v1.4.10 on Sun Jun 17 14:12:20 2012
*filter
:INPUT DROP [0:0]
:FORWARD ACCEPT [0:0]
:OUTPUT DROP [0:0]
-A INPUT -s 123.244.255.254/32 -d 192.168.0.14/32 -j ACCEPT 
-A INPUT -s 192.168.0.0/24 -d 192.168.0.14/32 -j ACCEPT      #local in
-A INPUT -i tun0 -j ACCEPT 
-A INPUT -i lo0 -j ACCEPT 
-A INPUT -j DROP 
-A OUTPUT -s 192.168.0.14/32 -d 123.244.255.254/32 -j ACCEPT 
-A OUTPUT -s 192.168.0.14/32 -d 192.168.0.0/24 -j ACCEPT     #local out
-A OUTPUT -o tun0 -j ACCEPT 
-A OUTPUT -o lo0 -j ACCEPT 
-A OUTPUT -j DROP 
COMMIT

Answer 4

Any news on this?

At what level is Cisco VPN client driver doing what in the networking stack that takes overrides a local administrator's ability to administer their machine?

I fully agree and was wondering about the same thing.

Anyway, it's an app that requires admin privileges to install and while it runs it may very well filter what you do...

My attempts on Windows fail too:

route change 0.0.0.0 mask 0.0.0.0 192.168.1.1 metric 1
 OK!

IPv4 Route Table
===========================================================================
Active Routes:
Network Destination        Netmask          Gateway       Interface  Metric
          0.0.0.0          0.0.0.0      192.168.1.1    192.168.1.230     21 <-- LAN
          0.0.0.0          0.0.0.0    192.168.120.1    192.168.120.3      2 <-- VPN

Haha. No metric below 20 here it seems.

Answer 5

I don't know if I have understood it right, but I first clarify my understanding:

You have a local LAN (for example, say 10.0.0.0/16, and a remote Cisco VPN Server (for example, 64.0.0.0/16). You want to connect to the VPN server through the Cisco VPN client and yet you need to have the LAN access. In this case you want to separate the whole 10.0.x.x/16 from the VPN connection). The following route must be added in a Mac client:

/sbin/route add -net 10.0 -interface en1

where en1 is the interface through which you are connected to your LAN. I know you can add the same thing in Windows and Linux as well.

Answer 6

Shrew Soft VPN software did the trick for me, also, as Ian Boyd suggested.

It can import Cisco VPN client profiles. I have used Cisco VPN Client version 5.0.05.0290, and after installing the Shrew VPN (version 2.1.7) and importing Cisco profile, I was able to access local LAN while connected to corporate VPN without any additional configuration of Shrew VPN connection (or software).