The most significant improvement introduced by Syncplify.me Server! v4.1 is the ability to use MongoDB’s authentication. As explained in a previous KB article, our deployment of MongoDB was secure even without authentication, but keeping in mind all possible scenarios our development team has worked hard to add direct support to MongoDB’s native authentication into our software. This article explains how to use the new MongoDB Authentication Utility (installed along with Syncplify.me Server! v4.1+) to enable/disable this feature as needed.
The procedures outlined in this article are suitable for all single-node Syncplify.me Server! deployments. High-Availability (HA) deployments will require a little more work.
Enabling MongoDB Authentication
To enable MongoDB authentication for Syncplify.me Server!, the first step is to run the MongoDB Authentication Utility. You can find it in the Syncplify.me Server! v4 group inside the Windows Start menu:
Once the MongoDB Authentication Utility is run, it will show the current status of your system services and DB authentication. If MongoDB authentication is not enabled you will see something like this:
To enable MongoDB authentication, please, tick the “MongoDB Security” check-box, type in a strong password of your choice, and push the “Apply Changes” button. Please, be aware that this will restart all your Syncplify-related system services, and your SFTP/FTP(S) server will be down for a few seconds.
Once you push the “Apply Changes” button, you can observe the MongoDB Authentication Utility at work, stopping and restarting your system services…
Once MongoDB authentication has been enabled, the Utility will show you something like this:
You’re all set. Your MongoDB is not protected by its own authentication scheme, and all Syncplify-related system services are already using it with the new security features.
Disabling MongoDB Authentication
Once enabled, you may want to disable MongoDB authentication for Syncplify.me Server!… If you wish to do so, you may use the same MongoDB Authentication Utility you originally used to enable it. Simply remove the check-mark from the “MongoDB Security” check-box and push the “Apply Changes” button as shown in the picture here below:
As we’ve already seen when we previously enabled MongoDB’s authentication, your system services will also be stopped and restarted while disabling MongoDB’s authentication:
Once everything is done, and all services are restarted, you will see that MongoDB’s authentication has been turned off, and all Syncplify-related system services are now using MongoDB directly without authentication:
And that’s really it. All it takes to enable/disable MongoDB’s authentication for Syncplify.me Server! is explained in this article. Please be aware that in case you’re using a more complex deployment (like an HA deployment) you will need to run the MongoDB Authentication Utility on all SFTP and all DB nodes, and choose the exact same password on all of them.