How To Install iptables on Debian 10

Learn how to install iptables on Debian 10 with this tutorial. iptables is administration tools for packet filtering and NAT

Introduction

In this tutorial we learn how to install iptables on Debian 10.

What is iptables

iptables is:

The iptables/xtables framework has been replaced by nftables. You should consider migrating now.

iptables is the userspace command line program used to configure the Linux packet filtering and NAT ruleset. It is targeted towards systems and networks administrators.

This package contains several different utilities, the most important ones:

iptables, iptables-save, iptables-restore (nft-based version)

iptables, iptables-save, iptables-restore (legacy version)

ip6tables, ip6tables-save, ip6tables-restore (nft-based version)

ip6tables, ip6tables-save, ip6tables-restore (legacy version)

arptables, arptables-save, arptables-restore (nft-based version)

ebtables, ebtables-save, ebtables-restore (nft-based version)

There are three methods to install iptables on Debian 10. We can use apt-get, apt and aptitude. In the following sections we will describe each method. You can choose one of them.

Install iptables Using apt-get

Update apt database with apt-get using the following command.

sudo apt-get update

After updating apt database, We can install iptables using apt-get by running the following command:

sudo apt-get -y install iptables

Install iptables Using apt

Update apt database with apt using the following command.

sudo apt update

After updating apt database, We can install iptables using apt by running the following command:

sudo apt -y install iptables

Install iptables Using aptitude

If you want to follow this method, you might need to install aptitude first since aptitude is usually not installed by default on Debian. Update apt database with aptitude using the following command.

sudo aptitude update

After updating apt database, We can install iptables using aptitude by running the following command:

sudo aptitude -y install iptables

How To Uninstall iptables on Debian 10

To uninstall only the iptables package we can use the following command:

sudo apt-get remove iptables

Uninstall iptables And Its Dependencies

To uninstall iptables and its dependencies that are no longer needed by Debian 10, we can use the command below:

sudo apt-get -y autoremove iptables

Remove iptables Configurations and Data

To remove iptables configuration and data from Debian 10 we can use the following command:

sudo apt-get -y purge iptables

Remove iptables configuration, data, and all of its dependencies

We can use the following command to remove iptables configurations, data and all of its dependencies, we can use the following command:

sudo apt-get -y autoremove --purge iptables

Dependencies

iptables have the following dependencies:

References

Summary

In this tutorial we learn how to install iptables package on Debian 10 using different package management tools: apt, apt-get and aptitude.