I run it in a rootless Podman container using Quadlets. Instead of opening the server’s ssh port, I only port-forward the container’s ssh port (e.g. 22 -> 2222). I have sign-ups enabled, since I want people to be able to contribute (or just create issues). But I have configured the server so that nobody can create a repository. They can still fork my repos and send a pull request.

I have yet to experiment with Actions. I assume the safest option would be to only enable it for my own commits, but I am not sure.

Lots of good answers already. Just want to add.

Block IP from every country that doesn’t have your users in it. That will go a long way.

Yes, Check Anubis, scraper bots follow every link they find and especially git forges basically have infinite links (every single commit and comparison between every single commit and every other).

I haven’t thought it through but there may be some implications on opening port 22 for git via ssh.

If it’s just you, and you’re fine with the regular login… Just disable signup and don’t add more authentication mechanisms like oauth/openID.

I’m using nginx as a reverse proxy as well. For now, I added a lot of “deny” directives to ban all the address ranges from Tencent, Alibaba, OpenAI. It’s not a 100% solution, but works well enough for me. I’m mostly worried about AI crawlers causing too much load on my server. And it stopped since, so I don’t think I’m gonna need Anubis and all these extra things in front if my applications. If you like you can look into solutions like a web application firewall like Crowdsec.

I run a forgejo server on the internet for myself so here’s my two cents.

OpenID or any other log in method is just a way to log in to an account on the forgejo server. With registrations disabled it shouldn’t be able to create an account, so there should be no issue. All the extra auth methods also need to be configured and are disabled by default.

Bot traffic can be pretty horrendous once they find your server, I’d say Anubis is basically a requirement at this point. I would also strongly recommend setting up fail2ban for http and ssh, and disabling ssh password auth.

You can use Forgejo with OIDC or normal login behind a reverse proxy. If you want to make a repo public, you need to add this to your App.ini under the [service] section: REQUIRE_SIGNIN_VIEW = false

Example:

[service]
REGISTER_EMAIL_CONFIRM = true
ENABLE_INTERNAL_SIGNIN = false
ENABLE_NOTIFY_MAIL = true
DISABLE_REGISTRATION = false
ALLOW_ONLY_EXTERNAL_REGISTRATION = true
ENABLE_CAPTCHA = false
REQUIRE_SIGNIN_VIEW = true
DEFAULT_KEEP_EMAIL_PRIVATE = false
DEFAULT_ALLOW_CREATE_ORGANIZATION = true
DEFAULT_ENABLE_TIMETRACKING = true
NO_REPLY_ADDRESS = noreply.localhost
REQUIRE_SIGNIN_VIEW = false

Then you can create a public repo which people can view without an account. You can change visibilty at any time

Acronyms, initialisms, abbreviations, contractions, and other phrases which expand to something larger, that I’ve seen in this thread:

[Thread #195 for this comm, first seen 28th Mar 2026, 14:10] [FAQ] [Full list] [Contact] [Source code]

• oauth, and control sign ups via there. Don’t let people sign up via forgejo itself.
• anubis, yeah. Or similar.
• forgejo actions is an optional component… and forgejo users can bring their own actions server. Of course, it’s a risk to them since the server owner could execute code in actions. But yeah.

Do you need to host it yourself? Codeberg is free, and they handle these concerns for you.

But yes, you will need to secure it against hackers and scrapers. Keep user permissions to a minimum, if you allow people to create accounts at all. And run it in a dmz network, so that in case it’s compromised they can’t access the rest of your LAN.