diff --git a/.gitea/workflows/deploy.yml b/.gitea/workflows/deploy.yml
index 96b9c55..effdd0e 100644
--- a/.gitea/workflows/deploy.yml
+++ b/.gitea/workflows/deploy.yml
@@ -12,7 +12,8 @@ name: Deploy to TrueNAS
 #
 # Compose project name is pinned to "cannamanage" so it updates the existing
 # containers and reuses the persistent "cannamanage_pgdata" volume on the host.
-# Live ports: backend 8081->8080, frontend 3000, db 5432
+# Live host ports: frontend 3000, backend 8081->8080 (LAN, healthcheck/debug).
+# db is internal-only (no host publish) — reachable as db:5432 on the compose net.
 
 on:
   push:
@@ -101,15 +102,24 @@ jobs:
 
       - name: Verify frontend
         run: |
-          for i in $(seq 1 10); do
-            if wget -q -O /dev/null http://192.168.188.119:3000; then
-              echo "✅ Frontend responding on :3000"
+          set -euo pipefail
+          # Probe the frontend on its own loopback INSIDE the container via the
+          # bundled node runtime. This is network-namespace-independent (no
+          # reliance on the host port being wired during a mid-recreate window,
+          # which caused a transient false-failure previously) and needs no
+          # wget/curl in the image. Any HTTP status < 500 counts as "up" — the
+          # root path returns 307 -> /login when unauthenticated, which is healthy.
+          echo "Waiting for frontend on container loopback :3000 ..."
+          for i in $(seq 1 20); do
+            if docker exec cannamanage-frontend node -e "require('http').get('http://127.0.0.1:3000/',r=>process.exit(r.statusCode<500?0:1)).on('error',()=>process.exit(1))"; then
+              echo "✅ Frontend responding after ${i} attempt(s)"
               exit 0
             fi
-            echo "  attempt $i/10 — waiting 5s"
+            echo "  attempt $i/20 — waiting 5s"
             sleep 5
           done
-          echo "❌ Frontend did not respond"
+          echo "❌ Frontend did not respond — recent logs:"
+          $COMPOSE logs --tail=40 frontend
           exit 1
 
       - name: Prune dangling images
diff --git a/docker-compose.truenas.yml b/docker-compose.truenas.yml
index 89f3e24..9c037b9 100644
--- a/docker-compose.truenas.yml
+++ b/docker-compose.truenas.yml
@@ -14,6 +14,12 @@
 #     -p cannamanage up -d --build --remove-orphans
 services:
   db:
+    # Internal-only: drop the host :5432 publish inherited from docker-compose.yml.
+    # Postgres must not be exposed to the LAN. The backend reaches it over the
+    # compose network (db:5432) and the deploy's ALTER USER reconcile uses
+    # `docker exec`, so no published host port is needed. (!override [] replaces
+    # the inherited ports list — compose otherwise concatenates lists.)
+    ports: !override []
     # POSTGRES_PASSWORD only takes effect on FIRST volume init; the existing
     # cannamanage_pgdata volume keeps its current role password. The live role
     # password is rotated out-of-band via `ALTER USER` to match ${DB_PASSWORD}.