imapControl

This repository contains code that implements a program that executes remote commands sent by email from an IMAP server. There is a sendCommand utility that sends an encoded command to the server. There is an imapControl service that monitors the IMAP mailbox, examines messages, decodes the command, and, if it is valid, executes the command. Messages are encoded uniquely using rolling random numbers and imapControl requires that each message it processes be unique. This prevents spoofing of command messages from a nonauthorized source. Note that the first valid control message received by imapControl is also assumed to be invalid. This prevents the program from processing a previously sent message after restarting (for whatever reason that might be).

The IMAP server and mailbox can be configured in the CMakeLists.txt file. Do not commit a modified version of this file to your cloned copy of this repository. It will contain authentication information for accessing an email account.

The rolling code parameters in the CMakeLists.txt file should be altered to produce your own unique number patterns although some randomization is done internally. The patterns are adjusted by modifying the LOCK_PARAMETERS which are in groups of three integers: a slope, a constant, and a modulo. You want the product of the slope and modulo to be large and less than 2^31 - 1 since this is programmed for 32 bit integers. You also want the constant to be prime or relatively prime with the modulo. There are books, such as "Numerical Recipes," that discuss how to select a good set of numbers for generating random number sequences with portable random number generators. I highly recommend you reference one to help you select a good set of numbers. Every three integers defines the random number characteristics for a "lock", a trailing zero stops the lock definitions. Every lock has a name, and every lock is associated with a program to run (a path name to an executable).

When sendCommand "lockname" is run, the "lockname" is encoded and sent to the IMAP server. imapControl polls the server, sees that there is a new message, and checks the message to see if it has an encoded "lockname". If it does, it executes the code at the path associated with the name.

Installation (assuming a Raspbian buster or better installation - should run on other Debian Linux machines also)

1. sudo apt-get update
2. sudo apt-get upgrade
3. sudo apt-get install git
4. git clone https://github.com/mbroihier/imapControl
   • cd imapControl
   • mkdir build
   • vi CMakeLists.txt and modify parameters discussed above
   • cd build
   • cmake ..
   • make
5. if you want imapControl to run as a service
   • vi imapControl.service - modify to point to your local paths
   • vi imapControlWrapper - modify to point to your local paths
   • sudo cp -p imapControl.service /lib/systemd/system
   • sudo systemctl enable imapControl.service
   • sudo systemctl start imapControl.service

Note: Take care with the executables. Email information can easily be extracted from them.