Unintentional Plex Port Forwarding

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signbit.phillips

• March 19, 2024 01:30

I have a weird one! Usually my Firewalla Gold is overly protective and I have to give it a few rules to tone it down. Kinda like my significant other! But in this instance that’s not the case. I have a Plex Server setup on an IoT VLAN on my network. I have it blocked from everything else on my network, besides the smart tv’s I have designated and it has unrestricted internet access. I don’t have ANY ports forwarded and UPnP is not enabled, BUT I can still access my Plex server remotely when I have remote access enabled on the server. Base on the Plex instructions; I should be required to forward a port, use “UPnP” or “NAT-PMP”, to allow access remotely. I have also ran a port scan with Plex remote access enabled and steaming a video but Firewalla say no external ports found. What could possibly be going on that is “allowing” this remote access? Is it using something like Tailscale? And how can I ensure I’m not accidentally allowing other port access?

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  Firewalla

  • March 19, 2024 03:33

  Does Plex uses a cloud relay? when you were connecting to plex from remote, do you connect to your home IP? or you login to their service?

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  signbit.phillips

  • March 19, 2024 15:04
  • Edited

  Thanks Firewalla team! I was able to confirm Plex was using their cloud relay service. Trying to access the server from my home IP was unsuccessful. As a test I opened the port and confirmed that I could connect remotely and when I scanned for open ports Firewalla was able to detect the port. 
  
  

  My paranoia is now gone and everything is locked down! Thanks for the quick response!

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