Category: CheckPoint

Repair A Corrupt Smartcenter Installation

This article details how to repair a corrupt smartcenter step-by-step. This process is valid for both Windows and *nix-based installations and platform-specific instructions are pointed out where necessary.

In fact, the word “repair” is somewhat misleading as what we really do is create a new smartcenter and use configuration files from the old install to effectively make a clone – all certificates, ICA, VPN etc will remain as they were so no re-SIC will be required with the gateway modules once you are up and running.

There are two ways to restore – minimal and complete. “Minimal” will make sure that all objects, rules, certificates and the user database are restored which is all that is needed a lot of the time. If however you would like to do a “complete” restore including licensing, database versions then the files are specified as well.

In addition, at the end of the article are two simple commands which can be used to gather up all of the files and place them in an archive for easy retrieval!

Minimal Restore Requirements

Objects and Rulebase

The following files are required to restore a smartcenter’s rulebase, objects and user database. The first two files are absolutely necessary and there is no point proceeding without them, fwauth.NDB is necessary to restore the user database:

• $FWDIR/conf/objects_5_0.C
• $FWDIR/conf/rulebases_5_0.fws
• $FWDIR/conf/slprulebases_5_0.fws
• $FWDIR/conf/fgrules.fws
• $FWDIR/conf/fwauth.NDB

Notes:

1. Check Point stores all the rulebases in one file, called ‘rulebases_5_0.fws’. This is the only rulebase file needed.
2. Check Point stores the desktop security rulebase in a database file called ‘slprulebases_5_0.fws’ (Secure LAN Policy).
3. Check Point stores all the objects, services, etc in one database file called ‘objects_5_0.C’.
4. Check Point users are stored in the file ‘fwauth.NDB’.
5. On Windows machines, %FWDIR%\conf\fwauth.NDB is only the pointer to the real user database file, for example, %FWDIR%\conf\fwauth.NDB522. In this case, rename the real database file %FWDIR%\conf\fwauth.NDB522 with the name %FWDIR%\conf\fwauth.NDB

Internal Certificate Authority Files

The ICA is what all other certificates are based on – SIC, VPN etc. restoreing these is necessary to avoid having to re-setup certificate-based VPNs, remote-worker certificates and re-establishing SICwith all managed gateways.

• $FWDIR/conf/InternalCA.*
• $FWDIR/conf/ICA*.*
• $CPDIR/conf/sic_cert.p12
• $FWDIR/conf/crls/*

Registry Data – SecurePlatform & Gaia

/opt/CPshared/registry/HKLM_registry.data

– copy everything under ‘SIC’

Registry Data – Windows OS

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\CheckPoint\SIC

(export this key and then import it on the target machine)

Full Restore Requirements

The following represents the complete set of files essential for a database restore:
• $CPDIR/conf/cp.license
• $CPDIR/conf/sic_cert.p12
• $CPDIR/database/*.C
• $CPDIR/registry/*
• $FWDIR/conf/lists/*
• $FWDIR/conf/*.fws
• $FWDIR/conf/*.conf (except for ‘components_reg.conf’, ‘fwrl.conf’, ‘cpmad_rulebase.conf’)
• $FWDIR/conf/masters
• $FWDIR/conf/fwmusers
• $FWDIR/conf/gui-clients
• $FWDIR/conf/*.C (except for ‘mv_doc.C’, ‘classes.C’, ‘scheme.C’, ‘fields.C’, ‘tables.C’, ‘rtmclasses.C’, ‘default_objects.C’)
• $FWDIR/conf/db_versions/Database/versioning_db.fws
• $FWDIR/conf/vpe/*
• $FWDIR/conf/XML/*
• $FWDIR/conf/cpsc/*
• $FWDIR/conf/I*
• $FWDIR/conf/crls/*
• $FWDIR/conf/db_versions/repository/*
• $FWDIR/conf/fwauth.NDB
• $FWDIR/conf/DiapCpdList.NDB
• $FWDIR/conf/DiapFwmList.NDB
• $FWDIR/conf/DAIP_RS_Database.NDB
• $FWDIR/conf/robo-gateways.NDB
• $FWDIR/conf/robo-control.NDB
• $FWDIR/conf/robo-ike.NDB

Note: If logs are required then the contents of $FWDIR/log/ should also be included (note that $FWDIR/log/ is a symbolic link to another partition on the hard disk and files should be retrieved from there).

Restore Process

1. Back up the files noted herein, offloading to a secure location.
2. Install the same version and feature set onto the replacement Security Management Server, ensuring that the same hostname and leading IP address are used.
3. Perform the installation as though this was a clean (new) Security Management Server installation.
4. If the new Security Management Server is rebooted at the conclusion of the installation, run ‘cpstop’ before restoring the files.
5. Copy the backups from Step 1 to the fresh installation.
6. Extract the backups to their appropriate locations.
7.   Before executing ‘cpstart’, delete the $FWDIR/conf/applications.C and $FWDIR/conf/CPMILink*

Automate File Retrieval

Use the below commands to automate retrieval of the files specified above. The files will be bundled into two files named backup1.tgz and backup2.tgz

Note: This does assume that the Check Point path variables $CPDIR and $FWDIR are available:
[Expert@mgmt]# tar -czvf backup1.tgz $FWDIR/conf/objects_5_0.C $FWDIR/conf/gui-clients $FWDIR/conf/fwmusers $FWDIR/conf/rulebases_5_0.fws $FWDIR/conf/slprulebases_5_0.fws $FWDIR/conf/fgrules.fws $FWDIR/conf/fwauth.NDB $FWDIR/conf/InternalCA.* $FWDIR/conf/ICA*.* $CPDIR/conf/sic_cert.p12 $CPDIR/conf/cp.license $CPDIR/registry/HKLM_registry.data $FWDIR/conf/crls

[Expert@mgmt]# tar -czvf backup2.tgz $CPDIR/conf/cp.license $CPDIR/conf/sic_cert.p12 $CPDIR/database/*.C $CPDIR/registry $FWDIR/conf/lists/* $FWDIR/conf/*.fws $FWDIR/conf/*.conf $FWDIR/conf/fwmusers $FWDIR/conf/masters $FWDIR/conf/*.C $FWDIR/conf/db_versions/Database/versioning_db.fws $FWDIR/conf/gui-clients $FWDIR/conf/vpe/* $FWDIR/conf/XML/* $FWDIR/conf/cpsc/* $FWDIR/conf/I* $FWDIR/conf/crls/* $FWDIR/conf/*.NDB