What service uses port 5432?

Port 5432 is commonly designated for PostgreSQL over the TCP protocol.

Is port 5432 considered high risk?

Port 5432 has a risk rating of High. Exposing database or remote shell management ports directly to the internet is a critical security risk.

Port Intelligence Profile

Port 5432: PostgreSQL

Analyze default service protocols, historical security vulnerabilities, hardening methods, and firewall rules for port 5432.

Default Service

PostgreSQL

Protocol

TCP

Risk Level

High

Port Range

System (1-1023)

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1. Port Purpose & Usage

PostgreSQL is an advanced, enterprise-class open-source object-relational database system. Port 5432 is the default port used by PostgreSQL database engines.

Common Service Implementations

PostgreSQL Server

Enterprise relational database engine.

2. Security Risks & Vulnerability Profiles

Direct public exposure of PostgreSQL database servers on port 5432 leads to SQL brute-forcing, password sniffing, and exploitation of query execution vulnerabilities (e.g. COPY FROM PROGRAM abuse).

Historical CVE References

CVE-2019-10208

PostgreSQL Privilege Escalation. A flaw in pg_dumpall allowed authenticated database administrators to run arbitrary commands on the system root namespace.

CVE-2013-1899

PostgreSQL Connection File Corruption. Attackers could send connection requests with specific characters to corrupt or write files, causing database crashes.

3. Hardening & Mitigation Checklist

Bind database listener to the localhost interface (listen_addresses = "localhost").

Use pg_hba.conf to whitelist specific client IPs and enforce trust authentication filters (md5, scram-sha-256).

Require SSL connections (ssl = on) to prevent credential sniffing on the wire.

4. Firewall Command Examples

Use the following system configurations to restrict open port exposure on Linux hosts:

# UFW: Disable public PostgreSQL traffic ufw deny 5432/tcp

# iptables: Limit port 5432 connections to secure application servers iptables -A INPUT -p tcp -s 10.0.0.50 --dport 5432 -j ACCEPT iptables -A INPUT -p tcp --dport 5432 -j DROP

Further Analysis

IP Intelligence

Geolocate server IPs

Check SSL

Audit TLS configurations

Database & Cache Ports

Ports often operate in clusters. When analyzing a service on Port 5432, security engineers typically check the status of these related ports.

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