12

How can I fix this error when I try connecting to the ftp server on filezila:

GnuTLS error -15: An unexpected TLS packet was received.

And this error on sublime ftpsync plugin:

ssl.SSLError: [SSL: WRONG_VERSION_NUMBER] wrong version number (_ssl.c:1515)

This are my vsftpd settings:

listen=YES
anonymous_enable=NO
local_enable=YES
write_enable=YES
local_umask=022
nopriv_user=vsftpd
virtual_use_local_privs=YES
guest_enable=YES
user_sub_token=$USER
local_root=/var/www/$USER
chroot_local_user=YES
hide_ids=YES
guest_username=vsftpd

rsa_cert_file=/etc/ssl/private/vsftpd.pem
rsa_private_key_file=/etc/ssl/private/vsftpd.pem

ssl_enable=YES
allow_anon_ssl=NO
force_local_data_ssl=YES
force_local_logins_ssl=YES

ssl_tlsv1=YES
ssl_sslv2=NO
ssl_sslv3=NO

require_ssl_reuse=NO
ssl_ciphers=HIGH

5 Answers 5

13

I tried adding a line to my configuration file. Open the config here:

sudo nano /etc/vsftpd.conf

And put this line at the bottom:

allow_writeable_chroot=YES

Afterwards, restart the service:

sudo service vsftpd restart

That fix it for me.

2
7

May be you have an error that has no relation with SSL.

  1. Try to deactivate SSL (ssl_enable=NO)
  2. Connect with your favorite FTP client.

Then you probably see the real error.

That's why the Francisc I.B answer has no relation with SSL.

1
  • That is for me the best answer: bad configuration leads to the GnuTLS -15 errror, and disabling TLS gives much more appropriate information
    – lauhub
    Nov 16, 2017 at 20:17
2

I ran into this same issue. Another thread advises against setting allow_writeable_chroot=YES for security reasons, namely to mitigate a "ROARING BEAST ATTACK".

Setting allow_writeable_chroot=YES means that vsftpd should allow the situation where the user's home directory is writeable by that user. Instead for security reasons I changed the permissions on the user's root folder from 777 to 555.

Original: drwxrwxrwx /home/ftpuser/

Changed to: dr-xr-xr-x /home/ftpuser/

This made the user's home directory NOT writeable by the user and thus I didn't have to use the allow_writeable_chroot=YES parameter. This is fine (and more secure) for my situation as I have a preset directory structure and don't want the user making new files or directories in their root folder anyways.

I figured this out when I switched the home directory to /var/ftp via the local_root=[path] parameter for vsftpd and it worked without having to set allow_writeable_chroot=YES. This folder /var/ftp is (755) but owned by root and thus not writeable by ftpuser.

0

Weirdly for me this issue cropped up when trying to ls after logging in.

It turned out to be that I had uninstalled httpd in favour of nginx and the folder I was using was owned apache:apache and the user got removed when I removed httpd. I chcon'd the directories to nginx:nginx and then replaced the user in these lines in my config file: guest_username=nginx nopriv_user=nginx

Hopefully this helps someone out there because the error messages weren't helpful at all.

0

I found so many confusing answers. I will post an

/etc/vsftpd.conf

that worked flawlessly for me in Ubuntu 18.04 using fileZilla as a client on 2019-09-04. The FTPS is deployed in an EC2 instance regulated by a very strict security group that only allows specific public IPS to access.

# FTPS Shim TLS configuration /etc/vsftpd.conf
# Run standalone?  vsftpd can run either from an inetd or as a standalone
# daemon started from an initscript.
# This directive enables listening on IPv6 sockets. By default, listening
# on the IPv6 "any" address (::) will accept connections from both IPv6
# and IPv4 clients. It is not necessary to listen on *both* IPv4 and IPv6
# sockets. If you want that (perhaps because you want to listen on specific
# addresses) then you must run two copies of vsftpd with two configuration
# files.
listen=YES
# Make sure PORT transfer connections originate from port 20 (ftp-data).
connect_from_port_20=NO
listen_port=38250
ftp_data_port=38255
# Allow anonymous FTP? (Disabled by default).
anonymous_enable=NO
# Uncomment this to allow local users to log in.
local_enable=YES
# Default umask for local users is 077. You may wish to change this to 022,
# if your users expect that (022 is used by most other ftpd's)
local_umask=022
# Activate directory messages - messages given to remote users when they
# go into a certain directory.
dirmessage_enable=YES
# If enabled, vsftpd will display directory listings with the time
# in  your  local  time  zone.  The default is to display GMT. The
# times returned by the MDTM FTP command are also affected by this
# option.
use_localtime=YES
# Activate logging of uploads/downloads.
xferlog_enable=YES
# If you want, you can have your log file in standard ftpd xferlog format.
# Note that the default log file location is /var/log/xferlog in this case.
xferlog_std_format=NO
# You may override where the log file goes if you like. The default is shown below.
xferlog_file=/var/log/vsftpd.log
log_ftp_protocol=YES
debug_ssl=YES
# You may change the default value for timing out an idle session.
idle_session_timeout=600
# You may change the default value for timing out a data connection.
data_connection_timeout=120
# You may fully customise the login banner string:
ftpd_banner=Welcome to Read-Only FTPS Shim service.
# You may restrict local users to their home directories.  See the FAQ for
# the possible risks in this before using chroot_local_user or
# chroot_list_enable below.
chroot_local_user=YES
allow_writeable_chroot=YES
# This option should be the name of a directory which is empty.  Also, the
# directory should not be writable by the ftp user. This directory is used
# as a secure chroot() jail at times vsftpd does not require filesystem
# access.
secure_chroot_dir=/var/run/vsftpd/empty
# This string is the name of the PAM service vsftpd will use.
pam_service_name=ftp
# FTPS Passive Mode. -Define port range for passive mode connections
pasv_enable=Yes
pasv_min_port=10100
pasv_max_port=10110
ssl_enable=YES
# force client to use TLS when logging in
allow_anon_ssl=NO
force_local_data_ssl=YES
force_local_logins_ssl=YES
ssl_tlsv1=YES
ssl_sslv2=NO
ssl_sslv3=NO
require_ssl_reuse=NO
ssl_ciphers=HIGH
# specify TSL certificate/private key
rsa_cert_file=/etc/ssl/certs/fullchain.pem
rsa_private_key_file=/etc/ssl/private/privkey.pem
force_local_logins_ssl=YES
force_anon_logins_ssl=YES
# Uncomment this to indicate that vsftpd use a utf8 filesystem.
utf8_filesystem=YES
# Users
userlist_enable=YES
userlist_file=/etc/vsftpd.user_list
userlist_deny=NO

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