Firezone, an open-source WireGuard-based alternative to OpenVPN AS

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I created Firezone to make it easier to host and manage your own WireGuard VPN server. While working at Cisco as a security automation engineer I experienced a lot of unnecessary pain managing secure network-level access into our cloud VPCs. I tried OpenVPN Access Server but I personally feel that security software should be open source to be validated (and improved) by the community. I discovered WireGuard and quickly fell in love with it, but soon found managing the peer configs to be a bit tedious and error-prone. So I built some convenience functionality on top, added a simple Web UI, and open sourced it. Firezone is packaged with Chef Omnibus so the only dependencies are a recent Linux kernel (4.19+) and the WireGuard module. The Web UI is built with Elixir/Phoenix (I’m a recovering full-stack Rails engineer) and runs as an unprivileged user. The Web UI communicates with two other Elixir applications that manage the WireGuard configuration and firewall configuration respectively. I built it this way to allow potentially decoupling the Web UI, VPN, and firewall hosts at some point in the future, but for now Firezone assumes they’re all running on the same host. The firewall application is essentially a frontend to nftables and currently functions as a simple egress firewall to block outbound traffic to specific hosts/CIDRs (in your private network or elsewhere). In the near term I’m planning to polish it up a bit and add more security features. Longer-term I’d like to add things like DNS-based ad blocking, IP blocklist support, LDAP / SSO authentication, and more user management features. I wanted to show it here and see what HN thinks. Hope you find it useful!

Visit product View on Hacker NewsSep 28, 2021

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Product HuntOn track for Day 1 leaderboard · Strong signals: user, open · Missing: mac, agents, macos

93%93% predicted probability of success on Product Hunt, based on ML models trained on real launch data.

best fitHighest predicted score across all platforms for this description.

Indie HackersFits the IH revenue-focused audience · Strong signals: created, vpn · Missing: supports, reddit linkedin, podcasting

85%85% predicted probability of success on Indie Hackers, based on ML models trained on real launch data.

Hacker NewsStrong engagement from HN community · Strong signals: open source, io · Missing: https docs, excited, just released

75%75% predicted probability of success on Hacker News, based on ML models trained on real launch data.

nativeThis product was originally launched on this platform.

AppSumoMay struggle as an AppSumo deal · Strong signals: host, soon · Missing: plus, platform, intuitive

50%50% predicted probability of success on AppSumo, based on ML models trained on real launch data.

TrustMRRLess likely to generate early MRR · Strong signals: personal, way · Missing: mobile apps, ios, entrepreneurs

38%38% predicted probability of success on TrustMRR, based on ML models trained on real launch data.

Acquire.comPre-revenue stage for this audience · Missing: arr, mrr, revenue

13%13% predicted probability of success on Acquire.com, based on ML models trained on real launch data.

BetaListMay not resonate with beta-testers · Missing: web3, chat, crypto

0%0% predicted probability of success on BetaList, based on ML models trained on real launch data.

Correct prediction on native model

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