Securing OpenClaw and Hermes AI Agents on One VPS: Hardening Lessons from Docker, SSH, and Prompt Injection Risks
A detailed case study examines the challenges of running OpenClaw and Hermes AI agents together on a single VPS, connected via an SSH channel with forced commands. The author deployed OpenClaw as an orchestrator handling Telegram messages and Hermes as an executor for heavy tasks inside its own Docker sandbox. Multiple security misconfigurations were discovered, including Docker publishing ports directly to 0.0.0.0, ufw being removed during iptables-persistent installation, and repeated resets of gateway.bind to lan. The built-in security audit revealed a critical issue where Telegram groups allowed arbitrary command execution without an allowlist. Additional risks included context file injection that could propagate through the ACP bridge and UID conflicts caused by cloud image defaults. The experience highlights that AI agents require strict least-privilege controls because they interpret arbitrary text as potential instructions.
HabrAug 10, 2026Translated from Russian