Database Access with Redis

If you want to configure Redis Cluster, please read Database Access with Redis Cluster.

This guide will help you to:

• Install and configure Teleport.
• Configure mutual TLS authentication between Teleport and Redis.
• Connect to Redis through Teleport.

Prerequisites

• Redis version 6.0 or newer.

• redis-cli version 6.2 or newer installed and added to your system's PATH environment variable.

• A host where you will run the Teleport Database Service. Teleport version 9.0 or newer must be installed.

  See Installation for details.

Step 1/5. Install and configure Teleport

Set up the Teleport Auth and Proxy Services

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=teleport.example.com [email protected]
tctl status
Cluster  teleport.example.com
Version  10.2.6
CA pin   sha256:abdc1245efgh5678abdc1245efgh5678abdc1245efgh5678abdc1245efgh5678

tsh login --proxy=myinstance.teleport.sh [email protected]
tctl status
Cluster  myinstance.teleport.sh
Version  10.1.9
CA pin   sha256:sha-hash-here

Set up the Teleport Database Service

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://apt.releases.teleport.dev/gpg \  -o /usr/share/keyrings/teleport-archive-keyring.asc
Source variables about OS version
source /etc/os-release
Add the Teleport APT repository for v10. You'll need to update this
file for each major release of Teleport.
Note: if using a fork of Debian or Ubuntu you may need to use '$ID_LIKE'
and the codename your distro was forked from instead of '$ID' and '$VERSION_CODENAME'.
Supported versions are listed here: https://github.com/gravitational/teleport/blob/master/build.assets/tooling/cmd/build-os-package-repos/runners.go#L42-L67
echo "deb [signed-by=/usr/share/keyrings/teleport-archive-keyring.asc] \  https://apt.releases.teleport.dev/${ID?} ${VERSION_CODENAME?} stable/v10" \| sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/teleport.list > /dev/null
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install teleport

Source variables about OS version
source /etc/os-release
Add the Teleport YUM repository for v10. You'll need to update this
file for each major release of Teleport.
Note: if using a fork of RHEL/CentOS or Amazon Linux you may need to use '$ID_LIKE'
and the codename your distro was forked from instead of '$ID'
Supported versions are listed here: https://github.com/gravitational/teleport/blob/master/build.assets/tooling/cmd/build-os-package-repos/runners.go#L133-L153
sudo yum-config-manager --add-repo $(rpm --eval "https://yum.releases.teleport.dev/$ID/$VERSION_ID/Teleport/%{_arch}/stable/v10/teleport.repo")
sudo yum install teleport

curl https://get.gravitational.com/teleport-v10.2.6-linux-amd64-bin.tar.gz.sha256
<checksum> <filename>
curl -O https://get.gravitational.com/teleport-v10.2.6-linux-amd64-bin.tar.gz
shasum -a 256 teleport-v10.2.6-linux-amd64-bin.tar.gz
Verify that the checksums match
tar -xzf teleport-v10.2.6-linux-amd64-bin.tar.gz
cd teleport
sudo ./install

curl https://get.gravitational.com/teleport-v10.2.6-linux-arm-bin.tar.gz.sha256
<checksum> <filename>
curl -O https://get.gravitational.com/teleport-v10.2.6-linux-arm-bin.tar.gz
shasum -a 256 teleport-v10.2.6-linux-arm-bin.tar.gz
Verify that the checksums match
tar -xzf teleport-v10.2.6-linux-arm-bin.tar.gz
cd teleport
sudo ./install

curl https://get.gravitational.com/teleport-v10.2.6-linux-arm64-bin.tar.gz.sha256
<checksum> <filename>
curl -O https://get.gravitational.com/teleport-v10.2.6-linux-arm64-bin.tar.gz
shasum -a 256 teleport-v10.2.6-linux-arm64-bin.tar.gz
Verify that the checksums match
tar -xzf teleport-v10.2.6-linux-arm64-bin.tar.gz
cd teleport
sudo ./install

Using this APT repo may result in breaking upgrades upon "apt upgrade" as all major versions will be
published under the same component. We recommend following the instructions in the
"Debian/Ubuntu (DEB)" tab instead.
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

Start the Teleport Database Service, pointing the --auth-server flag to the address of your Teleport Proxy Service:

teleport db start \  --token=/tmp/token \  --auth-server=teleport.example.com:3080 \  --name=example-redis \  --protocol=redis \  --uri=rediss://redis.example.com:6379 \  --labels=env=dev

Step 2/5. 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 3/5. Create Redis users

Each Redis user must be protected by a strong password. We recommend using OpenSSL to generate passwords:

openssl rand -hex 32

ACL GENPASS

Create a users.acl file, which defines users for your Redis deployment, passwords required to log in as a given user, and sets of ACL rules. Redis allows you to provide passwords in plaintext or an SHA256 hash. We strongly recommend using an SHA256 hash instead of plaintext passwords.

You can use the command below to generate an SHA256 hash from a password.

echo -n STRONG_GENERATED_PASSWORD | sha256sum

user alice on #57639ed88a85996453555f22f5aa4147b4c9614056585d931e5d976f610651e9 allcommands allkeys
user default off

For more ACL examples refer to the Redis documentation.

Step 4/5. Set up mutual TLS

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.

We will show you how to use tctl auth sign below.

When connecting to standalone Redis, sign the certificate for the hostname over which Teleport will be connecting to it.

For example, if your Redis server is accessible at redis.example.com, run:

tctl auth sign --format=redis --host=redis.example.com --out=server --ttl=2190h

The command will create three files:

• server.cas with Teleport's certificate authority
• server.key with a generated private key
• server.crt with a generated user certificate

You will need these files to enable mutual TLS on your Redis server.

Use the generated secrets to enable mutual TLS in your redis.conf configuration file and restart the database:

tls-port 6379
port 0
aclfile /path/to/users.acl
tls-ca-cert-file /path/to/server.cas
tls-cert-file /path/to/server.crt
tls-key-file /path/to/server.key
tls-protocols "TLSv1.2 TLSv1.3"

Once mutual TLS has been enabled, you will no longer be able to connect to the cluster without providing a valid client certificate. You can use the tls-auth-clients optional setting to allow connections from clients that do not present a certificate.

See TLS Support in the Redis documentation for more details.

Step 5/5. Connect

Log into your Teleport cluster and see available databases:

tsh login --proxy=teleport.example.com --user=alice
tsh db ls
Name          Description     Labels
------------- --------------- --------
example-redis Example Redis   env=dev

tsh login --proxy=mytenant.teleport.sh --user=alice
tsh db ls
Name          Description     Labels
------------- --------------- --------
example-redis Example Redis   env=dev

To connect to a particular database instance:

tsh db connect example-redis

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

tsh db connect --db-user=alice example-redis

If flag --db-user is not provided, Teleport logs in as the default user.

Now you can log in as the previously created user using the below command:

AUTH alice STRONG_GENERATED_PASSWORD

To log out of the database and remove credentials:

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

Supported Redis commands

Redis in standalone mode doesn't support the commands below. If one of the listed commands is called Teleport returns the ERR Teleport: not supported by Teleport error.

• HELLO
• PUNSUBSCRIBE
• SSUBSCRIBE
• SUNSUBSCRIBE

Next steps

• Learn how to restrict access to certain users and databases.
• View the High Availability (HA) guide.
• Take a look at the YAML configuration reference.
• See the full CLI reference.