Third-Party Virtual Network Services
With its partnership announcements with Imperva and Citrix, Cisco extends the Nexus 1000V vPath to a true virtual network ecosystem.
The Imperva SecureSphere Web Application Firewall (WAF) nicely complements Cisco's virtual security portfolio. With vPath steering HTTP and HTTPS traffic to Imperva's virtual appliance, VMs hosting web applications are transparently protected from attacks such as distributed denial-of-service (DDoS), phishing, and frauds. As a direct consequence, server virtualization environments can become compliant with standards such as those of the Payment Card Industry (PCI).
On the other hand, Citrix NetScaler 1000V evolves the relationship between Cisco and Citrix that started with virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) designs. Through this product, customers can deploy advanced features from Citrix NetScaler application delivery controllers in server virtualization environments. Ranging from Layer 4 server load-balance techniques and link load-balance to application-aware decisions, this Cisco commercialized virtual appliance uses vPath to simplify traffic steering within a tenant's virtual data center. Through vPath service chaining, Nexus 1000V also can apply the following services to a VM, in any desired order:
- Compute firewall (VSG)
- Edge firewall (ASA 1000V)
- WAN acceleration (vWAAS)
- Web application firewall (Imperva SecureSphere)
- Application delivery controller (Citrix NetScaler 1000V)