An enterprise SD WAN can modernize your network and propel your business in the digital age. Using network security to help protect the sensitive data within your enterprise and prevent external access is an ideal way to modernize your network, so getting the right resources for this is important and you can go to sites such as https://www.fortinet.com/solutions/small-business/security-sd-wan for this purpose. They are also a smart way to route traffic and better secure the network as a whole. There are several alternatives to running a full WAN solution on top of your firewalls and routers:
Metering WAN:This is running your WAN through a network connection that is managed by your computer rather than the device itself. This solution is also more cost effective in many ways. It allows for you to properly protect and monitor your network but also can reduce data on the WAN by eliminating costly connection and filtering.
VPN WAN:This is using a VPN (Virtual Private Network) connection to connect to the Internet from your computer. VPN WANs provide secure connections, meaning that your data remains on the WAN and not on the VPN server. However, VPN WANs usually impose stricter security requirements on the VPN server and therefore require higher data rates to serve. In addition, VPN WANs are typically installed in your enterprise on a dedicated, high performance network.
IP Forwarding WAN:Similar to the other WAN solutions, IP Forwarding WANs provide advanced options for protecting your network and for routing Internet traffic through your network. This is a good way to improve the performance and overall security of your enterprise network.
Are there any additional benefits to running a WAN on top of your firewall? There are some benefits and concerns as well:
Benefits
Predictability of network traffic: As long as your Firewall is properly configured, a WAN on top of your firewall can still use common port definitions (25, 80, etc) to route traffic through your firewall. This is helpful if you need to change your firewall rules on a regular basis. However, most WANs on top of your firewall do not use a port at all but route through specific ports. Therefore, if you modify your firewall rules to route through the same port every time, it will result in some delays on your WAN because traffic will have to traverse the firewall several times to reach the outside world. This causes delays when devices in the WAN send and receive data. For example, if you send and receive data through the ports 80 and 443, each time you send a message or perform a search for information, the traffic will have to traverse your firewall for several seconds in order to reach the outside world. This is why the WAN is often referred to as the bottleneck to the Internet as well as to the rest of your network.
Access: Access to the Internet and other high-speed networks is restricted because of the firewall’s active network traffic rules. A WAN on top of your firewall allows you to access the Internet as well as applications that need a standard internet connection (like email, internet browsing and Skype). This can be valuable to help your business better connect with competitors and the outside world. For example, you can have your office in the Philippines and let your business partners and clients access the internet from your office, or even have your laptop and tablet inside the conference room or private meeting room, thus giving customers the same experience that they have at your office.
