What are SSH tunnels and how do they work?
SSH Tunnelling

What are SSH tunnels and how do they work?

By Bartłomiej Szabłowski
Table of contents

What is an SSH tunnel?

An SSH tunnel consists of an encrypted tunnel created through an SSH protocol connection. Data transferred through the tunnel is encrypted, providing a secure connection between the two computers. SSH tunnels can be used to transfer data between computers, or to connect to a network resource that is not directly accessible from the internet.

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SSH tunnels can also be used to bypass network restrictions or to tunnel through a firewall. This can be useful in cases where a user needs to access a network resource that is blocked by a firewall or other security measure. You can also use SSH tunnels to access blocked websites or services from a country where they are restricted.

What are the types of SSH tunnels?

Local forwarding allows you can use a local device to safely access a network resource on a remote network. Read more.

Local port forwarding with SSH tunnel

Remote forwarding is used to access a network resource on a local network securely from a device on the Internet. Read more.

Dynamic port forwarding is useful when you want to connect to a remote network through a secure tunnel but don't know which ports on the remote network you need to access in advance. Read more.

How does SSH tunnel work?

  1. You connect to the remote device using an SSH client on your local device.
  2. The SSH client establishes an encrypted connection with the remote device using SSH protocol.
  3. You can then use this encrypted connection to transfer data between your local device and the remote device.

One common use of SSH tunneling is to securely access a remote network or a network resource that is not directly accessible from the Internet. For example, you can use SSH tunneling to access a database or a web application running on a private network from a public network.

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You can easily generate ssh tunnel commands, using our SSH port forwarding generator.

What are the most common use cases for SSH tunnels?

  1. Port forwarding: SSH tunneling can be used to forward a port on your local device to a port on a remote device. This allows you to access a service on the remote device as if it were running on your local device.
  2. Remote access: SSH tunneling can be used to securely access a remote network or a network resource that is not directly accessible from the Internet. For example, you can use SSH tunneling to access a database or a web application running on a private network from a public network.
  3. Secure file transfer: SSH tunneling can be used to securely transfer files between two devices over the Internet.
  4. Bypassing network restrictions or censorship: SSH tunneling can be used to bypass network restrictions or censorship. For example, you can use SSH tunneling to access blocked websites or services from a country where they are restricted.
  5. Network monitoring: SSH tunneling can be used to monitor network traffic and collect data for network analysis.
  6. Debugging: SSH tunneling can be used to debug network issues by creating a secure connection between two devices and capturing traffic between them.

If you want to find out more, we have plenty of articles covering SSH tunneling.

Bartłomiej Szabłowski • 34 Articles

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