2008/523 IPsec session failover

[Darren J Moffat]

Thejaswini Singarajipura wrote:
> 
> 
> Darren J Moffat wrote:
>> I'm missing the bigger picture here, or failing to see where it is 
>> covered in the materials.
>>
>> Can someone draw me a simple picture of a multi node cluster using 
>> this showing which IKE the client connects to originally and where and 
>> how the SADB's are passed between the nodes.
> 
> Attached below is a diagram of a 2-node cluster and a brief description 
> of how the client connections are handled.
>>
>> I think I understand how the failover happens with the switch from 
>> IDLE to MATURE.  The part I'm missing is how all the SC nodes get the 
>> SADB entries in the first place and how that is done securely.
> 
> The SADB is synchronized over SC private interconnects, which is a 
> private LAN and is detached from all other network.
> Hence I do not think we add any more vulnerability by this project.

I thought that SC could be deployed in such away that the nodes were 
physically quite far away from each other.  How is that private 
interconnect protected in that case ?   While this might sound like I'm 
asking about existing architecture of SC I don't believe that today 
highly sensitive key material is passed over this "private" SC interconnect.

How do customers *really* deploy this ?  Is it always true that only 
cluster nodes are connected ?  Are all the switches etc completely 
private or can VLANing be used to support multiple clusters or make a 
"private" interconnect over existing infrastructure ?

-- 
Darren J Moffat