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apitsch
Asked: 2017-11-18 21:54:08 +0800 CST

Accidentally deleted the ipsec.conf file - what to do now?

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While trying to setup my L2TP/IPSec VPN with strongswan and the network-manager-l2tp on Ubuntu 17.10 I accidentally deleted the ipsec.conf file from /etc.

Reinstalling strongswan didn't help to recreate the ipsec.conf file. How should I proceed if I still want to configure a L2TP/IPSec VPN connection?

vpn

1 Answers

  1. Best Answer

    It is reasonably straightforward to retrieve the required conf file from the 17.10 Ubuntu package. Use the following steps from the command line:

    sudo apt-get --download-only install strongswan
mkdir -v $HOME/testing
dpkg-deb -x /var/cache/apt/archives/strongswan-starter_5.5.1-4ubuntu2_amd64.deb $HOME/testing
sudo cp -v $HOME/testing/etc/ipsec.conf /etc

    This places the configuration file correctly in /etc and from here you will need to use elevated privileges (sudo) to edit the file using your favoured text editor. Once you are happy the testing directory can be safely removed:

    rm -rfv $HOME/testing

    The Ubuntu file is by default completely commented out but it gives 2 simple examples, either of which could be a great start for you:

    # ipsec.conf - strongSwan IPsec configuration file

# basic configuration

config setup
    # strictcrlpolicy=yes
    # uniqueids = no

# Add connections here.

# Sample VPN connections

#conn sample-self-signed
#      leftsubnet=10.1.0.0/16
#      leftcert=selfCert.der
#      leftsendcert=never
#      right=192.168.0.2
#      rightsubnet=10.2.0.0/16
#      rightcert=peerCert.der
#      auto=start

#conn sample-with-ca-cert
#      leftsubnet=10.1.0.0/16
#      leftcert=myCert.pem
#      right=192.168.0.2
#      rightsubnet=10.2.0.0/16
#      rightid="C=CH, O=Linux strongSwan CN=peer name"
#      auto=start

    Activate these settings by removing the '#' mark at the beginning of each line and then hopefully all will be well.

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