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Arista CloudVision gets multi-cloud, NSX security features
Arista CloudVision will soon be able to distribute security policies across Amazon, Google and Microsoft public clouds. Other upcoming features include VMware NSX integration.
Arista Networks has added to its CloudVision management console the ability to apply security policies across virtualized switching fabrics running on Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud and Microsoft Azure.
Arista also introduced this week an integration between Arista CloudVision and NSX, VMware's software for provisioning virtualized networks. The combination lets engineers take security policies created in NSX and apply them to Arista switches running in the data center.
The latest features come about a year after Arista introduced a virtualized version of its network operating system, called vEOS, for AWS, Google and Azure. At the time, Arista added some vEOS controls to CloudVision, which competes with Cisco CloudCenter.
The new multi-cloud feature within Arista CloudVision lets engineers modify the access control lists (ACLs) in vEOS switches, said Jeff Raymond, vice president of EOS product management. The capability, which the vendor calls Zone Segmentation Security, eliminates having to worry about the unique security mechanisms in each of the three public clouds.
Companies often create virtual networks in the public clouds to deliver security, load balancing and other services to applications. Amazon and Google call the networks Virtual Private Clouds (VPCs) while Microsoft refers to them as virtual networks (VNet).
Arista has integrated its Zone Segmentation feature with Zscaler's cloud-based web gateway. The integration lets companies use Zscaler to apply security policies for traffic heading from a campus network or remote office to the cloud provider. Arista CloudVision applies policies to traffic flowing between and within virtual networks.
Overall, Arista is using CloudVision to address a trend toward more collaboration between corporate networking and security teams, said Shamus McGillicuddy, an analyst at Enterprise Management Associates, based in Boulder, Colo. A recent EMA survey found that 91% of security and network infrastructure teams were working together using shared or integrated tools.
The latest Arista offerings also show the vendor recognizes its customers need security that stretches from the private data center to the public cloud, said Bob Laliberte, an analyst at Enterprise Strategy Group, based in Milford, Mass. "Building out a strong security ecosystem will be critical, and delivering a capable management platform for hybrid cloud environments will be important for its customers to effectively manage those hybrid environments."
VMware NSX integration with Arista CloudVision
The NSX integration bridges the gap between VMware virtual networks and Arista physical switches in the data center. With CloudVision, engineers will be able to take security policies created for NSX environments and apply them to workloads running on the hardware.
NSX policies define the network resources accessible to groups of workloads and applications running on the virtual network. CloudVision applies those policies to an Arista fabric by converting them into a format that can become a part of the switch's ACL.
As a result, engineers can save time by using just NSX for creating security policies, according to Raymond.
New hardware-based encryption in Arista routers
Finally, Arista plans to release four routers with built-in support for encryption standards. For the enterprise WAN, Arista embedded hardware-based IPSec in the 7020SRG for site-to-site virtual private networks. The router is a 10 GbE platform.
For the data center interconnect, Arista will provide MACsec encryption in the new 7280CR2M and the 7280SRAM. Both routers offer wire-speed encryption with 10 GbE and 100 GbE for up to 100 kilometers. For MACsec encryption up to 2,500 km, Arista introduced the 7280SRM, which has 200 GbE Coherent interfaces for metro and long-haul links.
Arista plans to release all the new technology by the end of September.
Arista sells its products primarily to tier-one and tier-two service providers, financial institutions and high-tech companies, including Microsoft, Amazon and Facebook.
Recently, however, the company has aimed some new hardware at enterprises with more mainstream data centers. In May, for example, the company introduced switches for the campus LAN.
