Fortinet 50A user manual Introduction, NAT/Route mode and Transparent mode

FortiGate-50A Installation and Configuration Guide Version 2.50

Introduction

The FortiGate-50A Antivirus Firewall is an easy-to-deploy and easy-to- administer solution that delivers exceptional value and performance for small office and home office (SOHO) applications.

PWR STATUS

INTERNAL EXTERNAL

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Your FortiGate-50A is a dedicated easily managed security device that delivers a full suite of capabilities that include:

•application-level services such as virus protection and content filtering,

•network-level services such as firewall, intrusion detection, VPN, and traffic shaping.

NAT/Route mode and Transparent mode

The FortiGate can operate in NAT/Route mode or Transparent mode.

NAT/Route mode

In NAT/Route mode, the FortiGate-50A is installed as a privacy barrier between the internal network and the Internet. The firewall provides network address translation (NAT) to protect the internal private network. You can control whether firewall policies run in NAT mode or route mode. NAT mode policies route allowed connections between firewall interfaces, performing network address translation to hide addresses on the protected internal networks. Route mode policies route allowed connections between firewall interfaces without performing network address translation.

Transparent mode

Transparent Mode provides firewall protection to a pre-existing network with public addresses. The internal and external network interfaces of the FortiGate unit must be in the same subnet and the FortiGate unit can be inserted into your network at any point without the need to make any changes to your network.

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