PORTS NUMBER

Computer ports have been around since the dawn of computing. The Advanced
Research Projects Agency Network (ARPANET) originated the concept of port
numbers.

Ports are used to identify a connection endpoint and direct data to a service. There
are virtual and physical ports: A USB port is an example of a physical port and often
the one that springs to mind when thinking about computer ports. However, virtual
ports are much more common, and this is where ports enter our story of how the
internet works. Ports are part of Layer 4, the transport layer, of the OSI model of the
internet.

To explain how ports work, we need to go back to an analogy of a letter addressed to

“Lucille Ball, 1000 Roxbury Drive, Beverly Hills, CA 90210,” In our post on IP
addresses, this analogy helps to explain how in the virtual address equivalent to the
letter; an IP address routed the letter to the destination. In the postal analogy, once a
letter reaches the final address, the name on the letter identifies specifically who the
letter is for; in this respect, a port is the equivalent of the name Lucille Ball.

There are many virtual ports, with port numbers ranging from 0 to 65535. The
internet protocols TCP and UDP decide which process the data packet is sent to; this
is based on a server-client scheme, as seen in our other pages on HTTP (Hypertext
Transfer Protocol) and HTTPS.

Port numbers come in the range of 0 to 65535. Numbers 1–1023 are assigned to services, and
1024 to 65535 are ephemeral ports used to identify a source. Port 0 is assigned by the
Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) as “reserved.”

WHAT ARE PORTS ?

Ports are either virtual or physical and are used to identify where a network begins and ends.
A virtual port is assigned a 16-bit unique number used to identify a connection endpoint and
direct data to a specific service or process. A port will be used to direct different types of
traffic as they enter a device, e.g., emails and web pages.
WHAT PROTOCOS DO PORTS USE ?

Ports use two types of protocols, Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) and User Datagram
Protocol (UDP). TCP offers a more reliable service as it uses in-order delivery of the byte
stream, breaking packets up into streams; any unacknowledged streams are re-sent.

14 common network ports No.

Port Number Usage

20 File Transfer Protocol (FTP) Data Transfer

21 File Transfer Protocol (FTP) Command Control

22 Secure Shell (SSH)

23 Telnet - Remote login service, unencrypted text messages

25 Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) E-mail Routing

53 Domain Name System (DNS) service

80 Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) used in World Wide Web

110 Post Office Protocol (POP3) used by e-mail clients to retrieve e-mail from a server

119 Network News Transfer Protocol (NNTP)

123 Network Time Protocol (NTP)

143 Internet Message Access Protocol (IMAP) Management of Digital Mail

161 Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP)

194 Internet Relay Chat (IRC)

443 HTTP Secure (HTTPS) HTTP over TLS/SSL

 50 common network ports No.
Port Service Transport
Number name protocol Description

7 Echo TCP, UDP Echo service

File Transfer Protocol data

FTP-data TCP, SCTP
20 transfer

TCP, UDP, File Transfer Protocol (FTP)

FTP
21 SCTP control connection

Secure Shell, secure logins, file

TCP, UDP,
SSH-SCP transfers (scp, sftp), and port
SCTP
22 forwarding

Telnet protocol—unencrypted
Telnet TCP
23 text communications

Simple Mail Transfer Protocol,

SMTP TCP used for email routing between
25 mail servers

Domain Name System name

DNS TCP, UDP
53 resolver

69 TFTP UDP Trivial File Transfer Protocol

Hypertext Transfer Protocol

(HTTP) uses TCP in versions
TCP, UDP,
HTTP 1.x and 2.
SCTP
HTTP/3 uses QUIC, a transport
80 protocol on top of UDP

88 Kerberos TCP, UDP Network authentication system

 Port Service Transport
Number name protocol Description

ISO Transport Service Access

Iso-tsap TCP
102 Point (TSAP) Class 0 protocol

Post Office Protocol, version 3

POP3 TCP
110 (POP3)

Microsoft EPMAP (End Point

Mapper), also known as
DCE/RPC Locator service, used
Microsoft
TCP, UDP to remotely manage services
EPMAP
including DHCP server, DNS
server, and WINS. Also used by
135 DCOM

NetBIOS Name Service, used

NetBIOS-ns TCP, UDP for name registration and
137 resolution

NetBIOS-
TCP, UDP NetBIOS Session Service
139 ssn

Internet Message Access

Protocol (IMAP), management
IMAP4 TCP, UDP
of electronic mail messages on
143 a server

HP
TCP, UDP HP data alarm manager
381 Openview

HP
TCP, UDP HP performance data collector.
383 Openview

HTTP over TCP, UDP, Hypertext Transfer Protocol

443 SSL SCTP Secure (HTTPS) uses TCP in
 Port Service Transport
Number name protocol Description

versions 1.x and 2. HTTP/3

uses QUIC, a transport protocol
on top of UDP.

464 Kerberos TCP, UDP Kerberos Change/Set password

Authenticated SMTP over

SMTP over
TLS/SSL (SMTPS), URL
TLS/SSL, TCP
Rendezvous Directory for SSM
SSM
465 (Cisco protocol)

587 SMTP TCP Email message submission

HTTP RPC Ep Map, Remote

procedure call over Hypertext
Microsoft Transfer Protocol, often used
TCP, UDP
DCOM by Distributed Component
Object Model services and
593 Microsoft Exchange Server

LDAP over Lightweight Directory Access

TCP, UDP
636 TLS/SSL Protocol over TLS/SSL

MS
TCP MS Exchange Routing
691 Exchange

VMware
unofficial VMware ESXi
902 Server

FTP over FTPS Protocol (data), FTP over

TCP, UDP
989 SSL TLS/SSL

FTP over FTPS Protocol (control), FTP

TCP, UDP
990 SSL over TLS/SSL
 Port Service Transport
Number name protocol Description

IMAP4 over Internet Message Access

TCP
993 SSL Protocol over TLS/SSL (IMAPS)

POP3 over Post Office Protocol 3 over

TCP, UDP
995 SSL TLS/SSL

Microsoft operating systems

tend to allocate one or more
unsuspected, publicly exposed
Microsoft services (probably DCOM, but
TCP
RPC who knows) among the first
handful of ports immediately
above the end of the service
1025 port range (1024+).

1194 OpenVPN TCP, UDP OpenVPN

WASTE Encrypted File Sharing

WASTE unofficial
1337 Program

Cisco VLAN Query Protocol

Cisco VQP TCP, UDP
1589 (VQP)

Valve Steam Client uses port

Steam UDP
1725 1725

2082 cPanel unofficial cPanel default

radsec, Secure RADIUS Service

TCP, UDP
2083 cPanel (radsec), cPanel default SSL

Oracle database listening for

Oracle DB TCP, UDP insecure client connections to
2483 the listener, replaces port 1521
 Port Service Transport
Number name protocol Description

Oracle database listening for

Oracle DB TCP, UDP SSL client connections to the
2484 listener

Symantec Symantec System Center agent

TCP, UDP
2967 AV (SSC-AGENT)

Xbox LIVE and Games for

XBOX Live TCP, UDP
3074 Windows – Live

3306 MySQL TCP MySQL database system

Some Blizzard games,

World of
TCP, UDP Unofficial Club Penguin Disney
Warcraft
3724 online game for kids

Google
unofficial Google Desktop Search
4664 Desktop

5432 PostgreSQL TCP PostgreSQL database system

virtual Network Computing

RFB/VNC
TCP, UDP (VNC) Remote Frame Buffer
Server
5900 RFB protocol

6665-6669 IRC TCP Internet Relay Chat .

BitTorrent is part of the full

BitTorrent unofficial
6881 range of ports used most often

BitTorrent is part of the full

BitTorrent unofficial
6999 range of ports used most often
 Port Service Transport
Number name protocol Description

6970 Quicktime unofficial QuickTime Streaming Server

Kaspersky
TCP Kaspersky AV Control Center
8086 AV

Kaspersky
UDP Kaspersky AV Control Center
8087 AV

VMware Server Management

VMware
TCP, UDP User Interface (insecure Web
Server
8222 interface).

PDL Data Stream, used for

PDL TCP printing to certain network
9100 printers.

Webmin, Web-based
Unix/Linux system
BackupExec unofficial
administration tool (default
10000 port)

NetBus remote administration

NetBus unofficial
12345 tool (often Trojan horse).

27374 Sub7 unofficial Sub7 default

Back Orifice 2000 remote

Back Orifice unofficial
31337 administration tools