Can Samba span the internet?

I know that NetBIOS is not supposed to be a routable protocol. However; I have made samba work in lab environment where it spanned across two routers. What I want to do is make it so that my linux server can be accessed through my router from the internet. I have setup samba so that any computer on my lan access it. I then forwarded ports 137-139 to my linux box on the router. This method has worked for telnet, ftp and ssh so it seemed as if it should have worked. Has anybody made this work or have any ideas? Thanks a lot. :)

I think it could work.. but I don't think it is even close to smart !!!

there are numerous better protocols (safer and faster) to use...

If I were you I'd go for sftp !

I always undersood that samba was pretty secure. What about it could be exploited? My passwords are intelligently chosen and I don't allow anonymous acces to my ftp. I don't see how my server could be hacked. You might know better than me though.

for example: sambal

this one works on all linux distro's and most bsd's..

Interesting......thanks for the info.

I have samba setup and running on my home lan. I love it!

It is great for a LAN and very easy to setup. I have had no problems with security, etc.

For outside access to my LAN, I use ssh. I have a cisco router as my gateway and have setup ACLs so I can only connect to it from two different subnets... school and work.

You can use ssh for a lot of stuff. I even have ssh to tunnel VNC if I want remote desktop. I can also xfer files back and forth with no problem.
From there, you can tunnel from one PC to another while it is still encrypted across the internet. It isn't encrypted across your LAN though... unless you setup ssh on every PC.

For most people, that should be enough.

I even use it to access my web server. Since I don't want to put it on the internet... remote desktop in and view it through a web browser that runs on my home PC. It is also good because then I'm not behind a proxy and I can view any site that I wish. That is good in a work environment because they can monitor what you do online. Just make sure that your work doesn't care if you use ssh. Everything from there is encrypted... so they can't tell wtf you're doing! ;)

Just my $.02... like you really care... :p

Thanks Phish, I guess you answered my question as to whether it can be accessed through an out side internet connection.