VPS or A Cloud Server will come with basic OS setup. Here are some of my basic practices getting started with setting up a VPS for deploying applications.

Setting up SSH Keys

Create SSH Keys on local machine

ssh-keygen -t ecdsa -f ~/.ssh/id_rsa_vps

Copy SSH Keys to VPS

ssh-copy-id -i ~/.ssh/id_rsa_vps.pub username@ip

Add ~/.ssh/config entry for easy access

cat ~/.ssh/config

Host vps1
    HostName ip
    User username
    IdentityFile ~/.ssh/id_rsa_vps
    ServerAliveInterval 240

(Optional) Disable password authentication

sudo nano /etc/ssh/sshd_config

Change the following lines

PasswordAuthentication no
PermitRootLogin no

# Restart SSH service
sudo systemctl restart sshd

This config will allow you to connect to VPS using ssh vps1 and the connection will be kept alive.

Setting up UFW

Install UFW

# Install UFW if not already installed
sudo apt install ufw

# Allow necessary ports
sudo ufw allow 22/tcp     # SSH
sudo ufw allow 80/tcp     # HTTP
sudo ufw allow 443/tcp    # HTTPS
sudo ufw allow 45876/tcp  # Beszel
sudo ufw allow 6443/tcp   # K3s

# Enable UFW
sudo ufw enable

# Check UFW status
sudo ufw status

Install CrowdSec or Fail2Ban

Crowdsec

curl -s https://install.crowdsec.net | sudo sh && sudo apt install crowdsec

Fail2ban

sudo apt install fail2ban

sudo cp /etc/fail2ban/jail.conf /etc/fail2ban/jail.local

sudo nano /etc/fail2ban/jail.local

Ensure the following lines are set:

# [sshd]
enabled = true
port = 22
maxretry = 5
bantime = 84600

sudo systemctl restart fail2ban

sudo fail2ban-client status
sudo fail2ban-client status sshd