How to Install and Configure Ntop to Monitor Network in Ubuntu

Ntop is an open-source and very useful network-monitoring tool that displays a list of hosts that are currently using the network and reports information concerning the IP traffic generated by each host. You can use a web browser to monitor your network traffic, connections and bandwidth usage. Ntop monitors and reports host traffic and supports various protocols like TCP/UDP/ICMP, IPX, ARP, DLC, Decnet, AppleTalk, and Netbios.

In this tutorial I will explain how to install and configure Ntop on Ubuntu 14.04.

Installing Ntop

You can install ntop by running the following command:

sudo apt-get install ntop

During installation you will be asked to enter the password for the administrator. Simply enter your password and finish installation.

After installing ntop, start ntop service:

sudo /etc/init.d/ntop start

By default, ntop listens on port 3000 to display network usage via a web browser.

To verify ntop is working, run:

sudo netstat -tulpn | grep :3000

You should see an output like the following:

View Ntop

You can see the ntop web interface by typing the url http://your-server-ip:3000 on your web browser.

The ntop screen has the following main menus:

• About: what are ntop, credits, documentations and configurations.
• Summary: traffic, hosts, network load, network flows
• All protocols: traffic, throughput, activity
• IP: summary, traffic directions, local
• Utils: data dump, view log
• Plugins: many plugins to enable or configure
• Admin: configure, shutdown

You can see a screenshot of some menus in the following images.

1. Ntop Configuration

You will see the version of ntop, name of operation system and date of ntop configuration.

2. Global Traffic Status

You will see the number of the network interface with IP address and global network traffic statistics.

3. Host Information

You will see the information of your host system like hostname, IP address, MAC address, DNS and your real IP address.

4. Network Load Statistics

You will see your network load statistics of the last ten minutes, last hour, last day and last month.

Conclusion

After installing Ntop, you can easily monitor your network usage, network load and network traffic in real time. Feel free to leave a comment if you have any questions.