Kafka Custom Hardening

In this section, you configure Kafka with hardening, incorporating your inputs.

Please follow the guidelines to set the correct settings according to your needs.

NOTE: If this is your first Kafka setup with customized hardening, proceed to step 3. In case you've had Kafka in the past, without hardening, and now you wish to add a hardening configuration, follow the instructions below:

1. Stop Kafka

$CONFLUENT_HOME/bin/kafka-server-stop -daemon ~/kafka/server.properties

2. Stop Zookeeper

$CONFLUENT_HOME/bin/zookeeper-server-stop -daemon ~/kafka/zookeeper.properties

3. Create Kafka certificates

run the following command on a single Kafka node only, set the password per your choice:

/opt/apps/kafka/secure_kafka.sh <PASSWORD>

4. Execute the Kafka setup with hardening flags

/opt/apps/kafka/kafka-setup.sh --ips 10.0.0.1,10.0.0.2,10.0.0.3  --replication_factor 3 [KAFKA_SSL_FLAGS]

Below are your KAFKA_SSL_FLAGS options:

Choose Keystore password only

--ssl --keystore_password <keystorePWD>

In this case, both the Truststore password and key password inside the keystore will be defined as the keystore password value.

Choose the Keystore and Truststore values

--ssl --keystore_path </path/to/keystore> --keystore_password <keystorePWD> --truststore_path </path/to/truststore> --truststore_password <truststorePWD>

In this case, the Keystore and Truststore paths are defined differently, where each has a different password.

Choose all SSL flags

--ssl --keystore_path </path/to/keystore> --keystore_password <keystorePWD> --truststore_path </path/to/truststore> --truststore_password <truststorePWD> --keypass <keyPWD>

In this case, Keystore and Truststore paths are defined differently, where each has a different password. Additionally, the Key password inside the keystore differs from the keystore password.

In case you have a cluster, copy the certificate tar.gz file to the whole cluster and repeat the above commands on every node.