In today’s digital landscape, the HTTP protocol is the backbone of the internet, powering millions of websites. But with this widespread usage comes a darker side—cyberattacks. Even the most obscure websites aren’t immune, facing numerous attacks daily.

To help protect your site, I want to introduce you to SafeLine, a highly regarded, community-driven Web Application Firewall (WAF) project.

What is SafeLine?

SafeLine is a free, open-source WAF that’s both powerful and easy to deploy. Built on advanced semantic analysis technology, SafeLine acts as a reverse proxy, shielding your site from malicious attacks.

The strength of SafeLine lies in its intelligent detection engine, designed specifically for the community. This means it’s built with real-world scenarios in mind, ensuring no hacker can breach your defenses.

How Does SafeLine Work?

Imagine your website’s traffic as a stream of data passing through various checkpoints before reaching your server. If a hacker tries to send malicious requests, they travel along the same path. SafeLine intercepts this stream, scrubs it clean of harmful traffic, and only allows legitimate requests to reach your server.

Here’s a simple breakdown of the traffic flow:

• External Users send requests.
• SafeLine intercepts these requests, detects malicious ones, and blocks them.
• Your Web Server only receives clean, safe traffic.

Getting Started with SafeLine

SafeLine is containerized, making it incredibly easy to set up. To get started, clone the repository and run the setup.sh script:

git clone git@github.com:chaitin/safeline.git
cd safeline
bash ./setup.sh

After installation, you can manage it through the local interface at https://127.0.0.1:9443/.

System Requirements

• Operating System: Linux
• Architecture: x86_64
• Dependencies: Docker 20.10.6+ and Docker Compose 2.0.0+
• Minimum Specs: 1 CPU core, 1 GB RAM, 5 GB Disk Space

Key Features of SafeLine

User-Friendly:

• Single-command installation with no setup costs.
• Pre-configured for security, so you don’t have to worry about maintenance.

Security-First:

• Utilizes an intelligent semantic analysis algorithm, offering precise detection with low false positives.
• No static rules, which means it's effective against even unknown 0day attacks.

High Performance:

• Linear detection engine with minimal latency.
• Capable of handling over 2000 TPS on a single core, with scalability depending on your hardware.

Reliability:

• Built on Nginx, ensuring both performance and stability.
• Health checks built-in, guaranteeing 99.99% uptime.

GitHub Repository: SafeLine on GitHub
SafeLine Demo: SafeLine Demo