21.2.2.6. vsftpd Configuration Options

Although vsftpd may not offer the level of customization other widely available FTP servers have, it offers enough options to satisfy most administrators' needs. The fact that it is not overly feature-laden limits configuration and programmatic errors.
All configuration of vsftpd is handled by its configuration file, /etc/vsftpd/vsftpd.conf. Each directive is on its own line within the file and follows the following format: 
directive=value
For each directive, replace directive with a valid directive and value with a valid value.

Important

There must not be any spaces between the directive, equal symbol, and the value in a directive.
Comment lines must be preceded by a hash symbol (#) and are ignored by the daemon.
For a complete list of all directives available, see the man page for vsftpd.conf. For an overview of ways to secure vsftpd, see the Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 Security Guide.
The following is a list of some of the more important directives within /etc/vsftpd/vsftpd.conf. All directives not explicitly found or commented out within the vsftpd's configuration file are set to their default value.
21.2.2.6.1. Daemon Options
The following is a list of directives that control the overall behavior of the vsftpd daemon.
  • listen — When enabled, vsftpd runs in standalone mode, which means that the daemon is started independently, not by the xinetd super-server. Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 sets this value to YES. Note that the SELinux ftpd_is_daemon Boolean option needs to be set for vsftpd to be allowed to run in standalone mode. See Section 21.2.2.4, “SELinux Policy for vsftpd” and to ftpd_selinux(8) for more information on vsftpd's interaction with the default SELinux policy. This directive cannot be used in conjunction with the listen_ipv6 directive.
    The default value is NO. On Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6, this option is set to YES in the configuration file.
  • listen_ipv6 — When enabled, vsftpd runs in standalone mode, which means that the daemon is started independently, not by the xinetd super-server. With this directive, it only listens on IPv6 sockets. Note that the SELinux ftpd_is_daemon Boolean option needs to be set for vsftpd to be allowed to run in standalone mode. See Section 21.2.2.4, “SELinux Policy for vsftpd” and to ftpd_selinux(8) for more information on vsftpd's interaction with the default SELinux policy. This directive cannot be used in conjunction with the listen directive.
    The default value is NO.
  • session_support — When enabled, vsftpd attempts to maintain login sessions for each user through Pluggable Authentication Modules (PAM). For more information, see the Using Pluggable Authentication Modules (PAM) chapter of the Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 Single Sign-On and Smart Cards and the PAM man pages. If session logging is not necessary, disabling this option allows vsftpd to run with less processes and lower privileges.
    The default value is YES.