WireGuard Could Soon Be On Its Way To The Linux Kernel

[phoronix]

Phoronix: WireGuard Could Soon Be On Its Way To The Linux Kernel

Announced last summer by Jason Donenfeld was the "WireGuard" project as a next-generation secure network tunnel for the Linux kernel. It's looking like this network addition could soon be reaching the mainline Linux kernel...

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=WireGuard-2017-Maturing

[boxie]

I am looking forward to having these VPNs in the kernel and then in my routers

[starshipeleven]

I am looking forward to having these VPNs in the kernel and then in my routers

LEDE has them, and the package is maintained by the main developer. There is also the webinterface addon.

https://danrl.com/blog/2017/luci-proto-wireguard/

[microcode]

Very exciting, using WireGuard has been a joy, and Jason Donenfeld is such a swell dude, I can hardly wait for it to be upstream.

[uid313]

What is so good about WireGuard?
How is it any different from Openswan and Libreswan, or other VPN software?
Does it have any advantages over other VPN software, and if so, what?

[boxie]

LEDE has them, and the package is maintained by the main developer. There is also the webinterface addon.

https://danrl.com/blog/2017/luci-proto-wireguard/

when Ubiquity support on their Edgerouter and Unifi USG* then I will be able to

[boxie]

What is so good about WireGuard?
How is it any different from Openswan and Libreswan, or other VPN software?
Does it have any advantages over other VPN software, and if so, what?

yes, it has advantages.

1. it is small (in terms of code base) - it only took a couple of hours to go over the code at the conf
2. it does no crypto itself - all proven kernel crypto.
3. it is very light
4. it is very simple

I could imagine a very simple NetworkManager GUI to set it up

[chuckula]

Can this thing be made cross-platform compatible at the protocol level so we could have non-Linux clients using it?

Additionally, I'm not 100% sure why it has to be in-kernel to work. That seems to open additional potential security holes above & beyond the headaches you can already get with something like OpenVPN.

[treba]

It doesn't need to be in-kernel but probably is way faster that way. Especially small embedded devices benefit from that.
In germany many privat (non-commercial) providers of free wifis use VPNs to get around legal headaches. Freifunk is a big example, who use OpenWRT/LEDE based firmware on many routers. When using OpenVPN, that often is a bottleneck.

[starshipeleven]

when Ubiquity support on their Edgerouter and Unifi USG* then I will be able to

The edgerouter is a debian, there are unofficial packages for it https://community.ubnt.com/t5/EdgeMA...r/td-p/1904764