Setup SNMPv3 on ESXI VMware server

SSH into the VMware server

ssh root@vmwareserver

Set the auth and priv types

esxcli system snmp set -a MD5 -x AES128

Generate hashes

The hashes are needed to create the user.  Replace authpass and privhash to the password you want.

esxcli system snmp hash --auth-hash authpass --priv-hash privhash --raw-secret

Create user 

Replace authhash and privhash with the auth and priv hashes returned from the above command.

esxcli system snmp set -e yes -C contact@incredigeek.com -u snmpuser/authhash/privhash/priv

 

Single line Command

Change authpassword and privpassword to your authentication and private passwords.

authpass="authpassword" && privpass="privpassword" && esxcli system snmp set -a MD5 -x AES128 && esxcli system snmp hash --auth-hash ${authpass} --priv-hash ${privpass} --raw-secret && esxcli system snmp set -e yes -C ${contact} -u snmpuser/${authhash}/${privhash}/priv

 

View SNMP Configuration

esxcli system snmp get

Setup SNMP v3 on Debian or Ubuntu

All the following commands should work on Ubuntu, or just about any other Debian based Linux distro.  If you have a firewall on the server, you’ll need to allow UDP on port 161.

Install SNMP

Install snmp, snmpd, and libsnmp.

sudo apt-get -y install snmp snmpd libsnmp-dev

Stop the snmpd service so we can add a user

sudo service snmpd stop

Add SNMP v3 user

  • Change AuthPassword to your Authentication password
  • Change CryptoPassword to your Crypto Password
  • Change privUser to your private users username
sudo net-snmp-config --create-snmpv3-user -ro -A AuthPassword -X CryptoPassword -a MD5 -x AES privUser

Change System Location, System Contact, and allow SNMP on all interfaces

Open up the SNMP config file usually in /etc/snmp/snmpd.conf

vi /etc/snmp/snmpd.conf

Search for “sysLocation”  and change to whatever your system location is.

Search for “sysContact” and change it.  It should be right underneath sysLocation.

Now allow SNMP on all interfaces.  Find the following line and comment it out.

agentAddress udp:127.0.0.1:161

Add a # to the beginning.

#agentAddress udp:127.0.0.1:161

Now find this line (should be a couple lines down from the line you just commented out)

#agentAddress udp:161,udp6:[::1]:161

and uncomment it

agentAddress udp:161,udp6:[::1]:161

That will enable it so you can read the SNMP info using the servers IP address, as opposed to being limited to localhost.

Start the SNMP service and Test

Start the SNMP service

service snmpd start

Test with

snmpwalk -v3 -a MD5 -A AuthPassword -X CryptoPassword -l authNoPriv -u privUser localhost