# WHATPORT(8996)

## NAME

port 8996 — Unassigned — The top of IANA's unassigned 8992–8996 block; no standard service lives here.

Protocol: TCP  
IANA registry

## DESCRIPTION

IANA lists 8992–8996 as Unassigned, so 8996 has no registration. No widely deployed product defaults to it, so an open 8996 is a locally chosen port for an application, a test listener, or a tunnel endpoint. Identify it by process rather than guessing from the neighbourhood.

## EXPOSURE

**Expose with care.** Unassigned ports get used for ad-hoc tunnels and debug listeners, which are exactly the things you do not want reachable.

## CHECK

```sh
sudo lsof -nP -iTCP:8996 -sTCP:LISTEN
```

## SEE ALSO

- iana — [IANA Service Name and Transport Protocol Port Number Registry — 8996](https://www.iana.org/assignments/service-names-port-numbers/service-names-port-numbers.xhtml?search=8996) (iana.org)

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HTML: <https://whatport.net/8996/> · JSON: <https://whatport.net/8996.json> · full dataset: <https://whatport.net/ports.json>