Adding too many host names in /etc/hosts.allow may cause the service to stop working

Solution Verified - Updated -

Issue

  • Is there a Maximum number of entries allowable in hosts.allow?
  • When adding one additional subnet entry into hosts.allow and then making a connection from that system, the SSH connection hangs (not a denial) and no new SSH connections will be allowed to connect. When this occurred, the CPU hit 100%.

Environment

  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6

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