RDP Connect to Your Github Action VM Free for 6 Hours

GitHub offers hosted virtual machines to run workflows, which contains an environment of tools, packages, and settings available for GitHub Actions to use. It also allows you install additional software on GitHub-hosted runners (Github hosted Action VM) as a part of your workflow. That gives us a chance to install enable RDP on a Windows server  and use Ngrok to proivde us a port for our RDP connection.

This post shows you how to configure this Github VM and how to RDP into it. 

More information about Github-hosted runners:

Runners are the machines that execute jobs in a GitHub Actions workflow. For example, a runner can clone your repository locally, install testing software, and then run commands that evaluate your code. GitHub provides runners that you can use to run your jobs, or you can host your own runners. Each GitHub-hosted runner is a new virtual machine (VM) hosted by GitHub with the runner application and other tools preinstalled, and is available with Ubuntu Linux, Windows, or macOS operating systems. When you use a GitHub-hosted runner, machine maintenance and upgrades are taken care of for you. 

Further details can be found from : https://docs.github.com/en/actions/using-github-hosted-runners/about-github-hosted-runners/about-github-hosted-runners

1. Github Account

2. Ngrok Account

Limitation:

VM only can exist for 6 hours. That is because Github's job run limitation.

The maximum number of minutes to let a job run before GitHub automatically cancels it. In default is 360 minutes. 

Steps

Log into your Github account and Ngrok account first.

1 Create a new Github Repository

2 Set up a wrokflow yourself

3 Paste the code in to new workflows / main.yml file then Commit changes...

Code also can be found from : https://github.com/HowToLearnHacking/uploads/blob/main/file.txt

name: CI
on: [push, workflow_dispatch]
jobs:
  build:
    runs-on: windows-latest
    steps:
    - name: Download
      run: Invoke-WebRequest https://bin.equinox.io/c/bNyj1mQVY4c/ngrok-v3-stable-windows-amd64.zip -OutFile ngrok.zip
    - name: Extract
      run: Expand-Archive ngrok.zip
    - name: Auth
      run: ./ngrok/ngrok.exe authtoken $Env:NGROK_AUTH_TOKEN
      env:
        NGROK_AUTH_TOKEN: ${{ secrets.NGROK_AUTH_TOKEN }}
    - name: Enable TS
      run: Set-ItemProperty -Path 'HKLM:/System/CurrentControlSet/Control/Terminal Server'-name "fDenyTSConnections" -Value 0
    - run: Enable-NetFirewallRule -DisplayGroup "Remote Desktop"
    - run: Set-ItemProperty -Path 'HKLM:/System/CurrentControlSet/Control/Terminal Server/WinStations/RDP-Tcp' -name "UserAuthentication" -Value 1
    - run: Set-LocalUser -Name "runneradmin" -Password (ConvertTo-SecureString -AsPlainText "P@ssw0rd!" -Force)
    - name: Create Tunnel
      run: ./ngrok/ngrok.exe tcp 3389

4 Click Settings - Security - Secrets and variables - Actions - New repository secret

Add a new repository secret

5 Delete the failed workflow run

6 Run CI workflow 

7 Go back to Ngrok webpage and find out Endpoint's URL

in this example, copy 6.tcp.ngrok.io:16449 , and it will be used as our RDP host value. 

8 RDP into your new Windows Server

username: runneradmin

password: P@ssw0rd!

Speed testing:

Videos

 

References

• Google chrome Remote Desktop - https://remotedesktop.google.com/
• tmate Instant terminal sharing - https://tmate.io/
• ngrok | Unified Application Delivery Platform for Developers - https://ngrok.com/
• https://github.com/HowToLearnHacking/uploads/blob/main/file.txt

Other related projects:

• https://github.com/yrifl/synvm
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PXYzpi6dfns
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxTv8EUEiZE
• https://github.com/Har-Kuun/OneClickDesktop