Virtual Private Networks
In modern corporate environments, there is a growing demand for connections to internal corporate networks from different locations (Natarajan, Muthiah & Nachiappan, 2010). It is a common need for employees to connect to private networks at home, from field service locations or while traveling at the airport, or from external networks via the Internet. The nature of the internet is uncertain (Stewart, 2013; Lim et al., 2001). As a result, security is a major concern for organizations where employees, customers, numbers, and business partners often connect to internal networks from remote locations.
Virtual private networks provide the technology that secures data sent over the Internet. VPNs allow users to create a virtual private tunnel through which they can access data, resources, and communications on internal networks over the Internet (Paul, 2000). This essay provides an overview of VPN and the underlying tunneling protocols used to enhance security, with a particular focus on the Layer 2 tunneling protocol for leased lines (Natarajan, Muthiah & Nachiappan, 2010).
Virtual private networks have become popular as the number of employees working remotely has increased.Virtual means physically absent, private means non-public whose network is an electronic communication system between two or more devices. The Internet is the backbone of virtual private networks. The motivating factors for companies to adopt VPN are the huge savings provided by virtual private networks and the reduction in maintenance and hardware costs (Rubin, 2003). The two main characteristics of a VPN are security and scalability.
Modern VPNs overcome security threats by using special tunneling protocols. How VPNs Work Virtual private networks require an Internet connection as the primary platform for sharing resources, communications, and data (Stewart, 2013). A virtual private network transfers data using a mechanism called tunneling. Before transmission, the packet is wrapped or encapsulated into a new packet with a new header. The header contains routing information that allows it to traverse a shared or public network before reaching the tunnel endpoint. A tunnel is a logical path, or path, through which encapsulated packets travel.