Network Agent and multiple NICs

Applies to

Web Filter v7.6

Web Security v7.6

Web Security Gateway v7.6

Web Security Gateway Anywhere v7.6

Network Agent and multiple NICs

Network Agent is capable of using more than one network interface card (NIC).

Best practices suggest a maximum of 5 NICs.

The NICs can be connected to ports on the same network device (switch or router), or to different network devices.

If the machine running Network Agent has multiple NICs:

u	Only one instance of Network Agent can be installed on the machine.

u	The blocking or inject NIC (used to serve block pages) must have an IP address.

u	Each NIC can be configured to monitor or block Internet requests, or both.

u	Each NIC can be configured to monitor a different network segment.

u	At least one NIC must be configured for blocking.

When you configure separate network cards to monitor traffic and send block messages (shown in the illustration below):

The monitoring and blocking NIC do not have to be assigned to the same network segment.

The monitoring NIC must be able to see all Internet traffic in the network segment that it is assigned to monitor.

Multiple monitoring NICs can use the same blocking NIC.

The blocking NIC must be able to send block messages to all machines assigned to the monitoring NICs, even if the machines are on another network segment.

A monitoring NIC can be set for stealth mode. For information on configuring stealth mode, see Configuring a stealth mode NIC.

The blocking NIC must have an IP address (cannot be set to stealth mode).

During installation, you specify which NIC is used by Websense software for communication and which NIC or NICs are used by Network Agent. For more information, see Installing Web Security components.

For information on configuring multiple NICs, see the TRITON - Web Security Help.