Greetings,

I am using ntop 3.2 on debian (package version 3.2-10) with the NetFlow
plugin receiving v9 flows from a Cisco 2800 series router.  The NetFlow
interface is the only configured interface in ntop; there is no pcap
interface. Everything works great, but only for a few hours (The duration
between breakage does not seem to be fixed).

After the problem occurs, accessing ntop via the web interface works fine,
but all statistics are blank and nothing updates. I have verified the router
is sending the flows and the ntop machine is receiving the packets using
tcpdump. Ntop is still listening on the correct port to receive them
according to netstat -l -p.

Viewing the NetFlow plugin statistics page reveals statistics that if
correct (which they aren't) would be alarming:

Flow Senders    192.168.XXX.XXX [1,622 pkts]
 
Number of Packets Received      1,622
Number of Packets with Bad Version      0
Number of Packets Processed     1,622
Number of Valid Flows Received  2,179,991,226
Average Number of Flows per Packet      40058.6
Number of V1 Flows Received     0
Number of V5 Flows Received     0
Number of V7 Flows Received     0
Number of V9 Flows Received     2,179,976,669
Total V9 Templates Received     362
Number of Bad V9 Templates Received     58
Number of V9 Flows with Unknown Templates Received      1,844
 
Discarded Flows
Number of Flows with Zero Packet Count  2,179,963,863
Number of Flows with Zero Byte Count    0
Number of Flows with Bad Data   0
Number of Flows with Unknown Template   1,844
Total Number of Flows Processed         27,362

The counter for number of flows received increases whether or not netflow
packets are actually arriving. The counter is incrementing by approximately
10 million per second. The packets processed counter never increments. When
valid netflow packets do actually arrive, the packets received counter which
would normally increment does not.

Restarting ntop brings everything back to normal. I am unsure whether or not
I could reliably capture the specific packet which might be causing this
problem, but I thought I'd ask the list for advice first. At the very least
it seems there is some kind of denial of service potential in the netflow
collector's processing.

Thanks,
John Laur

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