About

This repository includes my notes on enabling a true bridge mode setup with AT&T U-Verse and pfSense. I've tested and confirmed this setup with the ARRIS NVG589 and BGW210-700. There are a few other methods to accomplish this, so be sure to see what easiest for you. True Bridge Mode is also possible in a Linux via ebtables or using hardware with a VLAN swap trick. I did not have a Linux router and the VLAN swap did not seem to work for me.

While many residential gateways offer something called IP Passthrough, it does not provide the same advantages of a true bridge mode. For example, the NAT table is still managed by the gateway, which is limited to a measily 8192 sessions (although it becomes unstable at even 60% capacity).

This method will allow you to fully utilize your own router and finally solve that pesky NAT table limit.

Quick Setup

Prerequisites

• You need at least three network interfaces on your pfSense server.
• The MAC address of your Residential Gateway
• Local or console access to pfSense
• pfSense 2.4.3 (confirmed working, other versions should work but YMMV)

If you don't have three NICs, you can buy this cheap USB NIC one from Amazon. I've confirmed it works in my setup. It is compatible with FreeBSD 11.1 and I didn't have to install anything to get it working. Also, don't worry about the poor performance of USB NICs. This third NIC will only send/recieve a few packets periodicaly to authenticate your Router Gateway. The rest of your traffic will utilize your other (and much faster) NICs.

Install

1. Logon to your pfSense box via SSH.

2. Copy the bin/ng_etf.ko kernel module to /boot/kernel (because it isn't included with pfSense):

   a) Use the pre-compiled kernel module from me, a random internet stranger:

   scp bin/ng_etf.ko root@pfsense:/boot/kernel/
   chmod 555 /boot/kernel/ng_etf.ko
   

   b) Or you, a responsible sysadmin, can compile the module yourself from a trusted FreeBSD 11.1 machine:

   fetch ftp://ftp.freebsd.org/pub/FreeBSD/releases/amd64/amd64/11.1-RELEASE/src.txz
   tar -C / -zxvf src.txz
   cd /usr/src/sys/modules/netgraph
   make
   scp etf/ng_etf.ko root@pfsense:/boot/kernel/
   ssh root@pfsense chmod 555 /boot/kernel/ng_etf.ko
   

3. Edit the following configuration variables in bin/pfatt.sh as noted below. $RG_ETHER_ADDR should match the MAC address of your Residential Gateway. AT&T will only grant a DHCP lease to the MAC they assigned your device.

   ONT_IF='em0'
   RG_IF='em1'
   RG_ETHER_ADDR='xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx'
   

4. Copy bin/pfatt.sh to /usr/local/etc/rc.d to enable it to run at boot:

   scp bin/pfatt.sh root@pfsense:/usr/local/etc/rc.d/
   ssh root@pfsense chmod +x /usr/local/etc/rc.d/pfatt.sh
   

5. Connect cables:

   • $RG_IF to Residiential Gateway
   • $ONT_IF to ONT
   • LAN NIC to local switch (as normal)

6. Prepare for console access.

7. Reboot.

8. pfSense will detect new interfaces on bootup. Follow the prompts on the console to configure ngeth0 as your pfSense WAN. Your LAN interface should not change.

9. Configure the WAN interface (ngeth0) to DHCP

10. Configure your WAN interface to use the MAC address of your Residential Gateway.

11. Ensure that $RG_IF is added as an interface and enabled.

If every thing is setup correctly, netgraph should be bridging EAP traffic between the ONT and RG, and tagging the WAN traffic with VLAN0.

Troubleshoot

tcpdump

You should run tcpdumps on the $ONT_IF interface and the $RG_IF interface:

tcpdump -ei $ONT_IF
tcpdump -ei $RG_IF

From the $RG_IF interface, you should see some EAPOL starts like this:

MAC (oui Unknown) > MAC (oui Unknown), ethertype EAPOL (0x888e), length 60: POL start

These packets come every so often. I think the RG does some backoff / delay if doesn't immediately auth correctly. You can always reboot your RG to initiate the authentication.

If your netgraph is setup correctly, the EAP start packet from the $RG_IF will be bridged onto your $ONT_IF interface. Then you should see some more EAP packets from the $ONT_IF interface and $RG_IF interface as they negotiate 802.1/X EAP authentication.

Once that completes, you should start seeing 802.1Q (tagged as vlan0) traffic on your $ONT_IF interface.

Then, you can start another tcpdump on the vlan0 interface to see if netgraph is bridging over the VLAN0 traffic to ngeth0:

tcpdump -ei ngeth0

If you don't see traffic being bridged between ngeth0 and $ONT_IF, then netgraph is not setup correctly.

If the VLAN0 traffic is being properly handled, next pfSense will need to request an IP. ngeth0 needs to DHCP using the authorized MAC address. You should see an untagged DCHP request on ngeth0 carry over to the $ONT_IF interface gged as VLAN0. Then you should get a DHCP response and you're in business.

netgraph

The netgraph system provides a uniform and modular system for the implementation of kernel objects which perform various networking functions.

Your netgraph should look something like this:

Try these commands to inspect whether netgraph is configured properly.

1. Confirm kernel modules are loaded with kldstat -v. The following modules are required:

   • netgraph
   • ng_ether
   • ng_eiface
   • ng_one2many
   • ng_vlan
   • ng_etf

2. Issue ngctl list to list netgraph nodes. Inspect pfatt.sh to verify the netgraph output matches the configuration in the script.

Virtualization Notes

This setup has been tested on physical servers and virtual machines. Virtualization adds another layer of complexity for this setup, and will take extra consideration.

QEMU / KVM / Proxmox

Proxmox uses a bridged networking model, and thus utilizes Linux's native bridge capability. Unfortunately due to the two types of traffic we are bridging (EAP/802.1X and VLAN0/802.1Q), I could never get the traffic to forward through the Linux bridge to the virtual interface of my pfSense VM. Instead, I had to utilize PCI passthrough for my $RG_IF and $ONT_IF NICs.

I believe EAP/802.1X just requires setting the group_fwd_mask, but I'm not sure how to get the VLAN0/802.1Q traffic to bridge. If you know why, please open an issue!

Alternatively, you can also do the EAP / VLAN0 magic at the Linux hypervisor layer. Apply the Linux method, then bridge the Linux vlan0 interface to your pfSense VM.

ESXi

I haven't tried to do this with ESXi. Feel free to submit a PR with notes on your experience.

OPNSense / FreeBSD

I haven't tried this with OPNSense or native FreeBSD, but I imagine the process is the same with netgraph. Feel free to submit a PR with notes on your experience.

Other Methods

Linux

If you're looking how to do this on a Linux-based router, please refer to this method which utilizes ebtables and some kernel features. The method is well-documented there and I won't try to duplicate it. This method is generally more straight forward than doing this on BSD. However, please submit a PR for any additional notes for running on Linux routers.

VLAN Swap

There is a whole thread on this at DSLreports. The gist of this method is that you connect your ONT, RG and WAN to a switch. Create two VLANs. Assign the ONT and RG to VLAN1 and the WAN to VLAN2. Let the RG authenticate, then change the ONT VLAN to VLAN2. The WAN the DHCPs and your in business.

However, I don't think this works for everyone. I had to explicity tag my WAN traffic to VLAN0 which wasn't supported on my switch.

U-verse TV

TODO

References

• http://blog.0xpebbles.org/Bypassing-At-t-U-verse-hardware-NAT-table-limits
• https://forum.pfsense.org/index.php?topic=111043.0
• http://www.dslreports.com/forum/r31632582-
• http://www.netbsd.org/gallery/presentations/ast/2012_AsiaBSDCon/Tutorial_NETGRAPH.pdf

Credits

This took a lot of testing and a lot of hours to figure out. A unique solution was required for this to work in pfSense. If this helped you out, please buy us a coffee.

• rajl - 1H8CaLNXembfzYGDNq1NykWU3gaKAjm8K5
• aus - 31m9ujhbsRRZs4S64njEkw8ksFSTTDcsRU