Port trigger - How to set up
Solution 1:
- Neither are truly related to security, although some use the phrase "security through obscurity". If this case, if you use port triggering, you can obscure your actual port. For example, if you wanted to open up RDP (which uses port 3389), you could use port 33444 that triggers/forwards to 3389. This isn't really security, but it may help a little bit because you aren't directly exposing port 3389.
- Port target is, in the RDP example, port 3389. The port trigger is what you want your router to accept and forward to your target. For example, port 33444 is the trigger, and port 3389 is the target. So 33444->3389. Which means if you were outside your home and wanted to RDP into your computer, you would connect to YOUR_IP:33444 because the router would then forward the traffic in your LAN to port 3389 on your PC. Note: this is still a security risk, but if you want to do it anyway, you can lock down the traffic by changing the "Remote Desktop" rules in Windows Firewall to only accept certain IP addresses. Or what I do is use Duo Authentication for RDP which will make it so when you connect via RDP your phone will ask you to confirm you are logging in. It's 2FA for RDP.
- For CSGO and other Source Engine games, you only use 1 port per each game server. So if you have 2 game servers, port 27015 would go to server #1, and port 27016 would go to server #2. TCP and UDP. I don't recommend going outside the recommended 27015-27031 range for your game servers, because Steam's browser is familiar with that port range because everyone uses that range. If the server is just for you and your friends and they have your IP address, you can use pretty much any port, but if you want the public to join and play, try to stick between 27015-27031. For this reason, I do not recommend using port triggering for CSGO/Source Engine games. Just do a standard port forward. If you do a port forward for 27015-27031, you will have opened 17 ports. Rather than specifying a huge range, it's better to make 1 port forward per service, whether that's a game server or SourceTV or Steam port. That will keep it organized and more secure because you're only opening exactly what is required. Here is Valve's page on the topic. So if you only have 1 game server but want to enable the other services, make 1 rule per port.
Let me know if you have any questions, I used to be a game server admin myself. 😊