Port forward not working with EE smart hub

[freddy2004]

I just installed the EE smart hub. I'm having lots of problems when I copied port forward rules from the previous router. Most rules were not working. I could not figure out the be pattern. e.g. 9480-9499  udp/tcp worked fine while 5190-5199 udp did not.

Has anyone worked out what definitely works what doesn't?

Has EE got any firmware upgrade plan to fix the bug?  

[bobpullen]

@cosbug - what port are you trying to forward and what Smart Hub model are you using?

What operating system is running on the server? If it's Windows then have you ensured that the network connection is set to 'Private' and not 'Public'? If Linux, then can you see any evidence of a connection attempt in the firewall logs?

Is the static LAN IP on the server configured by the hub or directly on the server. If you look at the network map in the Hub Manager then does the IP address of the server match the one used by the port forwarding rule?

I'll admit to being confused by this though: -

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@cosbug wrote:

I can only ping the WAN IP address of the hub from internet remotely...

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EE hubs do not respond to ICMP/ping requests from the Internet 🤔

[JimM11]

@bobpullen It is alleged that setting the DMZ with the IP for a network device that does ICMP can get you through the firewall on the Router, do not have any EE equipment so cannot try or test that! Was a thinkbroadband.com way of setting up a BQM to a BT/EE router.

[bobpullen]

@JimM11 - yep, that would 'work' however, @cosbug hasn't mentioned anything about enabling the DMZ? Indeed, if they have (and pointed it to the server in question), then port forwarding is somewhat irrelevant.

[cosbug]

The ports I want to port forward are TCP 2443 (HTTPs) and TCP 2222 (SSH).

Smart Hub Plus SH31B, Firmware version: r3.8.24-R-1531355-PROD-83002, App version: 3.1.3

I've got Ubuntu Linux running on server. Firewalld/ IPTables disabled.

The LAN IP for server is allocated via DHCP from hub but it's set to be "static" (not change on lease expiration).

The server NIC is configured to use DHCP.

Yes, in network map it does display the correct IP address of the server (same as displayed in port forwarding rule).

[bobpullen]

@cosbug - thanks for the detail. I've tried but failed to replicate your problem - using a Smart Hub Plus running the same r3.8.24 firmware.

From a laptop running Ubuntu 24.04.3 LTS...

• Spun up an Apache website on port 2443 that uses self-signed TLS certificate
• Enabled SSH and changed the listening port to 2222

I then used the Hub Manager to ensure that the 'always use this IP address' toggle was enabled for the laptop and created two port forwarding rules like this: -

Then from a machine on another Internet  connection (EE mobile network in this case)...

SSH is accessible: -

> ssh [REDACTED]@[REDACTED].hopto.org -p 2222
The authenticity of host '[[REDACTED].hopto.org]:2222
([109.180.[REDACTED]]:2222)' can't be established.
ED25519 key fingerprint is
SHA256:[REDACTED].
This key is not known by any other names.
Are you sure you want to continue connecting (yes/no/[fingerprint])? yes
Warning: Permanently added '[[REDACTED].hopto.org]:2222' (ED25519) to the
list of known hosts.
[REDACTED]@[REDACTED].hopto.org's password:
Welcome to Ubuntu 24.04.3 LTS (GNU/Linux 6.8.0-87-generic x86_64)

And HTTPS webserver is accessible: -

Which would suggest that the problem is likely something to do with your local environment/setup 🤔