Safenet HighAssurance 1000 Gateway

Product Details

This Product Review is in the following Category:
Network security

This Product Review is in the following Sub-category:
Security Appliances

	Version:
	Vendor:	SafeNet Inc.
	Website:	www.safenet-inc.com
	Price:	£4,495
	Date:	7-Oct-05
	Author:	Robert Jaques

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The first thing we noticed was the lack of any documentation. Given this, we were pleasantly surprised to find a clear setup PDF for the device on Safenet’s website, but this data should be supplied with the unit.

Setup was very convoluted for such a small device. It starts by connecting the cable from the unit’s public Ethernet interface to our network switch. We then connected a second Ethernet cable from its private Ethernet port to our network port. The other option is via a serial cable in the VPN unit’s console port.

We could then connect to the private Ethernet interface to access the first stage of the unit’s setup via a terminal emulation program, such as HyperTerminal.

When prompted for username and password, we used the manufacturing defaults of admin and safenet. To make configuration changes, the local administrator enters the enable command with the default ID and password.

As it was being connected to a network in which the public interface can obtain an IP address from our DHCP server, we entered the show interfaces command to display the DHCP-assigned IP address.

Like all Safenet appliances, this one is managed by the Security Management Center (SMC), a Java-based policy management application with SNMP-based control and monitoring.

It coordinates policy across multiple Safenet devices and HighAssurance Remote VPN clients. The default manufacturing configuration allows an IPsec connection from the SMC to the appliance’s public interface.

For such a small box, this device gave us quite a headache. It would have been so much easier with adequate documentation.

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Product Rating

Features	***
Ease of Use	***
Performance	****
Documentation	**
Support	***
Value for Money	***
Overall Rating	***

For: Scalability for up to 1,000 VPN connections.

Against: No documentation provided with unit.

Verdict: Not for the faint of heart.

Product Details