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A firewall config can block listening? What would that firewall config be? The firewall can block packets by owner uid. But I am not sure who is the owner in legitimate sshd case. Root or the user logged in?

SELinux can do it, probably other LSMs, too.

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you cant block the actual port bind, but you can block any packets from reaching it, so the difference is mostly semantics

Yes, but that port needs to remain "open" for the legitimate sshd traffic. Can you see a difference in ownership as the firewall sees it between sshd and some user daemon? Sshd drops root partially when login succeeds.

that has nothing to do with sshd's listening socket, which remains owned by root

Sure the listening one remains owned by root. But the connected one? If you limit packets from/to e.g. 2222 to uid 0, will legitimate ssh traffic work? I don't say it won't, genuinely unsure. Haven't tried and today is a holiday. Maybe tomorrow :)

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