Database Access with Self-Hosted PostgreSQL

This guide will help you to:

• Set up Teleport to access your self-hosted PostgreSQL.
• Connect to your databases through Teleport.

Prerequisites

• A self-hosted PostgreSQL instance.
• A host, e.g., an Amazon EC2 instance, where you will run the Teleport Database Service.

tctl status
Cluster  tele.example.com
Version  9.2.3
CA pin   sha256:sha-hash-here

tsh login --proxy=myinstance.teleport.sh [email protected]
tctl status
Cluster  myinstance.teleport.sh
Version  9.1.2
CA pin   sha256:sha-hash-here

Step 1/5. Set up the Teleport Auth and Proxy services

Teleport Database Access for PostgreSQL is available starting from the 6.0 release.

teleport configure --acme [email protected] --cluster-name=tele.example.com > /etc/teleport.yaml

proxy_service:
  enabled: "yes"
  web_listen_addr: :443
  public_addr: tele.example.com:443
  acme:
    enabled: "yes"
    email: [email protected]

sudo teleport start

tsh login --proxy=mytenant.teleport.sh
tctl status

The Database Service requires a valid auth token to connect to the cluster. Generate one by running the following command against your Teleport Auth Service and save it in /tmp/token on the node that will run the Database Service:

tctl tokens add --type=db

Install Teleport on the host where you will run the Teleport Database Service:

Download Teleport's PGP public key
sudo curl https://deb.releases.teleport.dev/teleport-pubkey.asc \  -o /usr/share/keyrings/teleport-archive-keyring.asc
Add the Teleport APT repository
echo "deb [signed-by=/usr/share/keyrings/teleport-archive-keyring.asc] https://deb.releases.teleport.dev/ stable main" \| sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/teleport.list > /dev/null
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install teleport

sudo yum-config-manager --add-repo https://rpm.releases.teleport.dev/teleport.repo
sudo yum install teleport
Optional:  Using DNF on newer distributions
$ sudo dnf config-manager --add-repo https://rpm.releases.teleport.dev/teleport.repo
$ sudo dnf install teleport

curl https://get.gravitational.com/teleport-v9.2.3-linux-amd64-bin.tar.gz.sha256
<checksum> <filename>
curl -O https://get.gravitational.com/teleport-v9.2.3-linux-amd64-bin.tar.gz
shasum -a 256 teleport-v9.2.3-linux-amd64-bin.tar.gz
Verify that the checksums match
tar -xzf teleport-v9.2.3-linux-amd64-bin.tar.gz
cd teleport
sudo ./install

curl https://get.gravitational.com/teleport-v9.2.3-linux-arm-bin.tar.gz.sha256
<checksum> <filename>
curl -O https://get.gravitational.com/teleport-v9.2.3-linux-arm-bin.tar.gz
shasum -a 256 teleport-v9.2.3-linux-arm-bin.tar.gz
Verify that the checksums match
tar -xzf teleport-v9.2.3-linux-arm-bin.tar.gz
cd teleport
sudo ./install

curl https://get.gravitational.com/teleport-v9.2.3-linux-arm64-bin.tar.gz.sha256
<checksum> <filename>
curl -O https://get.gravitational.com/teleport-v9.2.3-linux-arm64-bin.tar.gz
shasum -a 256 teleport-v9.2.3-linux-arm64-bin.tar.gz
Verify that the checksums match
tar -xzf teleport-v9.2.3-linux-arm64-bin.tar.gz
cd teleport
sudo ./install

Create a Teleport user

Create a local Teleport user with the built-in access role:

tctl users add \  --roles=access \  --db-users=\* \  --db-names=\* \  alice

For more detailed information about database access controls and how to restrict access see RBAC documentation.

Step 2/5. Create a certificate/key pair

Teleport uses mutual TLS authentication with self-hosted databases. These databases must be configured with Teleport's certificate authority to be able to verify client certificates. They also need a certificate/key pair that Teleport can verify.

Create the secrets:

Export Teleport's certificate authority and a generate certificate/key pair
for host db.example.com with a 1-year validity period.
tctl auth sign --format=db --host=db.example.com --out=server --ttl=2190h

The command will create 3 files: server.cas, server.crt and server.key which you'll need to enable mutual TLS on your PostgreSQL server.

Step 3/5. Configure your PostgreSQL server

To configure your PostgreSQL server to accept TLS connections, add the following to the PostgreSQL configuration file, postgresql.conf:

ssl = on
ssl_cert_file = '/path/to/server.crt'
ssl_key_file = '/path/to/server.key'
ssl_ca_file = '/path/toa/server.cas'

See Secure TCP/IP Connections with SSL in the PostgreSQL documentation for more details.

Additionally, PostgreSQL should be configured to require client certificate authentication from clients connecting over TLS. This can be done by adding the following entries to PostgreSQL's host-based authentication file pg_hba.conf:

hostssl all             all             ::/0                    cert
hostssl all             all             0.0.0.0/0               cert

You should also ensure that you have no higher-priority md5 authentication rules that will match, otherwise PostgreSQL will offer them first, and the certificate-based Teleport login will fail.

See The pg_hba.conf File in the PostgreSQL documentation for more details.

Step 4/5. Start the Database Service

On the host where you will run the Teleport Database Service, start Teleport with the appropriate configuration.

teleport db start \   --token=/tmp/token \   --auth-server=teleport.example.com:3080 \   --name=test \   --protocol=postgres \   --uri=postgres.example.com:5432 \   --labels=env=dev

teleport db configure create \   -o file \   --token=/tmp/token \   --proxy=teleport.example.com:3080 \   --name=test \   --protocol=postgres \   --uri=postgres.example.com:5432 \   --labels=env=dev

teleport start --config=/path/to/teleport-db.yaml --token=/tmp/token

Step 5/5. Connect

Once the Database Service has joined the cluster, log in to see the available databases:

tsh login --proxy=teleport.example.com --user=testuser
tsh db ls
Name    Description        Labels
------- ------------------ --------
example Example PostgreSQL env=dev

Note that you will only be able to see databases your role has access to. See RBAC section for more details.

To connect to a particular database server, first retrieve credentials from Teleport using tsh db login command:

tsh db login example

You can optionally specify the database name and the user to use by default when connecting to the database instance:

tsh db login --db-user=postgres --db-name=postgres example

Once logged in, connect to the database:

tsh db connect example

To log out of the database and remove credentials:

Remove credentials for a particular database instance.
tsh db logout example
Remove credentials for all database instances.
tsh db logout