VRF-lite security domains

Understanding VRF-lite

VRF-lite provides network isolation on a single device at Layer 3. Each VRF domain can use the same or overlapping network addresses, as they have independent routing tables. This separation of the routing tables prevents communication to Layer 3 interfaces in other VRF domains on the same device. Each Layer 3 interface belongs to exactly one VRF instance and traffic between two Layer 3 interfaces on the same VRF instance is allowed as normal. But by default, interfaces in other VRF instances are not reachable as no route exits between the interfaces unless explicitly configured via Inter-VRF routing.

vlan1

vlan2

10.

1/24

PC1

.1/24

1/8

.1/16

vlan3

vlan5

vlan4

PC2

vlan6

Company A

10.

1/24

PC3

1/24

Company B

PC4

PC5

VRF red

VRF green

Company C

PC6

VRF blue

For example, on a device three VRF instances (VRF red, VRF green and VRF blue) are configured for three different companies. Devices PC1 and PC2 from Company A can communicate normally within the confines of VRF red, but none of PC1’s and PC2’s traffic can be seen by other devices in VRF green and VRF blue.

Route table and interface management with VRF-lite

A key feature that VRF-lite introduces to a router is the existence of multiple IP route tables within the one router.

By default, before any VRF is configured, a router will have one route table, and routes via all IP interfaces of the router will be stored in this one table. As VRF instances are configured on the router, the original route table remains. This default route table, and its associated IP interfaces, are then referred to as the default global VRF domain.

Interface management with VRF

Each network interface can belong to only one VRF. As mentioned above, initially every interface is in the default global VRF domain. As Layer 3 interfaces are moved to the created VRF instances, they are removed from the global VRF domain, so the global VRF domain manages a decreasing set of Layer 3 interfaces.

Page 6 Configure VRF-lite

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