Mini-Howto: SNMP (Simple Network Management Protocol)

Thu, 21 Jan 2010 12:33:06 +0000

This Howto covers some SNMP Basics and examples how you can read some values

Introduction

The “Simple Network Management Protocol” is a powerful possibility to query network-devices for information, or even to manage them. It’s often also a security risk. As SNMP is a bit difficult to use at the beginning some administrators just skip over it. This can lead to security holes, when SNMP is activated by default on devices. For example on some HP-Switches I configured the default setting for SNMP was set to “read + write” for “public”. SNMP was limited to the local network, but still this enables all connected servers to shutdown ports and have other fun as they wanted. Often the configuration is like that to enable some configuration tools to control the switches.

Snmp on iniy.org

Mini-Howto: SNMP (Simple Network Management Protocol)

Introduction