Polkadot Hello World Article Series
Polkadot Hello World #4: Security and Availability Aspects of Your Validator Node
This is the fourth article of the series, click on the link above the Title to get a list of articles.
In this article, I will address two topics in the context of the security and availability aspects of your Validator Node. I’m aware that the tips presented are just covering the tip of the “security and availability” iceberg for a PoS validator node. Nevertheless, I find them useful to get a minimal amount of security and availability to your test instance.
Protecting Your Validator Node
Exposing Blockchain or Crypto Services on the internet will always attract attacker who may try to crack your system. So better be prepared to take any measure to reduce the risk to be compromised.
When running my Polkadot Validator I observed quite an extensive amount of attackers who tried to brute force my ssh password.
One of the first things I did, was to install SSHGuard. So what is SSHGuard? As Andrew Schartzmeyer describes in his blog:
SSHGuard monitors servers from their logging activity. When logs convey that someone is doing a Bad Thing, sshguard reacts by blocking he/she/it for a…
