Step 4: Download and Install the Network Sensor Software
Now that you’ve provisioned your Insight Network Sensor host, you’re ready to download and install the network sensor software. You can download the network sensor installer from the Network Sensors tab of your “Data Collection” screen in your Insight platform home page.
Download the Network Sensor Installer
Privileges required
You must be a platform or product administrator to access and download the network sensor installer.
To download the network sensor installer:
- Go to insight.rapid7.com  and sign in with your Insight account credentials.
- If you do not see the “My Products & Services” screen upon signing in, open the app switcher in the upper left corner of the screen and click My Account.
- Expand your left menu and click the Data Collection Management tab.
- On the “Data Collection Management” screen, click the Network Sensors tab.
- If this is your first network sensor configuration, click Install to open the download panel.
- If you’ve already deployed a network sensor before, click the Add New dropdown in the upper right corner of the screen and click Network Sensor.
The network sensor installer comes in the form of a .deb
or .rpm
package that you will need to execute on your intended Linux host.
The network sensor installer includes the Insight Agent
In order for the Insight platform to identify and communicate with your network sensor host, all installations of the network sensor also come prepackaged with the Insight Agent. The token you specify in your installer execution command is the same token that accompanies your standalone Insight Agent deployments.
- On the download panel, click the Linux (64-bit) button to download the network sensor package. If you’re not downloading the installer directly to the network sensor host, relocate the installer package to your intended host machine.
Install the Network Sensor Software
After downloading the file for the architecture of your choice, place the installer in a directory on the host machine and navigate to it.
Privileges required
You must have administrator privileges on your network sensor host to complete this installation procedure.
To install the Network Sensor on RedHat-based Linux (.rpm)
- Open a terminal and navigate to the current directory of the installer. Install the package with the following command, using either the
RPM
orDNF
package managers:
RPM installation command
sudo rpm -i ./rapid7-network-sensor.x86_64.rpm
DNF installation command
sudo dnf -i ./rapid7-network-sensor.x86_64.rpm
- Identify the Installed Insight Agent version, to be used in the next step, using the following command:
RPM command
rpm -qi rapid7-insight-agent | grep Version
DNF command
dnf info rapid7-insight-agent | grep Version
To install the Network Sensor on Debian-based Linux (.deb)
- Open a terminal and navigate to the current directory of the installer. Install the package with the following command:
sudo apt-get install ./rapid7-network-sensor_amd64.deb
- Identify the Installed Insight Agent version, to be used in the next step, using the following command:
apt show rapid7-insight-agent | grep -Po 'Version: [\d.]+'
Configure the Insight Agent
With a Linux installation of the Network Sensor, you must configure the Insight Agent using the platform token.
Generate a Token
For this configuration option you will need to locate (or generate, if necessary) your organization’s token by navigating to insight.rapid7.com  > Data Collection > Agents > Agent Installer > Token Management.
- Use the following configuration command, substituting {token} with your organization’s token:
sudo /opt/rapid7/ir_agent/components/insight_agent/{version}/configure_agent.sh --start --token {token}
Network Sensor software installation and NICs
After your network sensor software installation completes, the Insight Agent identifies your network sensor host and reports back to the Insight platform with details of the system, including both your Network Interface Controllers (NICs). You will determine which of these NICs is connected to your network traffic source in the final step of this deployment procedure.