Cisco Virtual Security Gateway for Nexus 1000V Series Switch Configuration Guide, Release 4.2(1)VSG1(1)

Zones

A zone is a logical group of virtual machines (VMs) or hosts. Zones simplify policy writing by allowing users to write policies based on zone attributes using zone names. The zone definitions map the VMs to the zones. The logical group definition can be based on the attributes associated with a VM or a host, such as VM attributes defined in the vCenter. Zone definitions can be written as condition-based subnet and endpoint IP addresses.

Because zones and object groups can be shared between various rules with different directions, the attributes used in an object group should not have a directional sense and must be neutral attributes.

This example shows how the zone is expressed in the show running-config command output:

Object Groups

An object group is a set of conditions that are relevant to an attribute. Because object groups and zones can be shared between various rules with different directions, the attributes used in an object group condition should not have a directional sense and must be neutral. An object group is a secondary policy object that assists in writing firewall rules. A rule condition can refer to an object group by using an operator.

This example shows how the object groups are expressed in the show running-config command output:

Rules

Firewall rules can consist of multiple conditions and actions. Rules can be defined in a policy as a condition-based subnet or endpoint IP addresses and VM attributes.

Actions are the result of a policy evaluation. You can define and associate one or more of the following actions within a specified rule:

• Permit
• Drop packet
• Log
• Inspection

This example shows how the rule is expressed in the show running-config command output:

Policies

Firewall policies bind rules to a given policy, creating a rank among the rules. A policy enforces network traffic on a Cisco VSG and is constructed by using the following set of policy objects:

• Rules
• Conditions
• Actions
• Object-groups
• Zones

A policy is bound to a Cisco VSG using a set of indirect associations. The security administrator can configure a security profile and then refer to a policy name within the security profile. The security profile is associated with a port profile that has a reference to a Cisco VSG.

This example shows how the policy is expressed in the show running-config command output:

This example shows how conditions are expressed in the show running-config command output:

Cisco Virtual Security Gateway Attributes

This section describes Cisco Virtual Security Gateway attributes.

This section includes the following topics:

• Information About Attribute Name Notations
• Attribute Classes

Information About Attribute Name Notations

This section includes the following topics:

• Directional Attributes
• Neutral Attributes

Directional Attributes

A firewall policy is direction sensitive. An attribute in a rule condition requires that you have specified if the attribute is relevant to a source or a destination. The prefixes src., dst., or an attribute name are used to provide the sense of direction.

Neutral Attributes

Because object groups and zones can be shared between various rules with different directions, the attributes used in an object group should not have a directional sense. Attributes without a directional sense (that do not provide a direction prefix such as src. or dst.) are called neutral attributes.

Two rule conditions with different directions can share the same object group definition. A neutral attribute and net.ip-address used in the object-group can be associated with the directional attributes, such as src.net.ip-address and dst.net.ip-address, used in the different rules.

Attribute Classes

Cisco VSG attributes are classified into the following classes:

• Network Attributes
• VM Attributes
• Zone Attributes

Attributes are used in configuring policy rules and conditions, or zone definition. Zones can be defined using VM attributes.

Network Attributes

This section describes the VSG network attributes (see Table 6-2 ).

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VM Attributes

The VM attributes are attributes that are related to the virtual machine infrastructure and include the following classes of VM attributes:

• Virtual infrastructure attributes—These attributes are obtained from the VMware vCenter and are mapped to the names listed in Table 6-3 .
• Port profile attributes—These attributes are associated with port profiles.
• Custom attributes—These attributes can be configured under a service profile.

Table 6-3 describes the VM attributes supported.

Custom VM attributes are user-defined attributes that can be configured under a service profile.

This example shows how to verify the VM attributes on a Cisco VSG using the show vsg vm command:

Zone Attributes

Table 6-4 lists the zone attributes supported by the Cisco VSG.

Security Profiles

The security profile defines custom attributes that can be used to write policies. All the VMs tagged with a given port profile inherit the firewall policies and custom attributes defined in the security profile associated with that port profile. Each custom attribute is configured as a name value pair such as state = CA.

This example shows how to verify the security profile on a Cisco VSG using the show vsg security-profile brief command:

This example shows how to verify the security profile on a Cisco VSG using the show vsg security-profile command:

Viewing Security Profiles and Policies on the Cisco VNMC and the Cisco VSG

The Cisco VNMC GUI provides a view of the Cisco VSG security policy objects. The policy objects shown in the Cisco VNMC GUI are not necessarily shown in the same organizational path location as they appear in the Cisco VSG CLI when you enter the show runnning-config command.

For example, in the Cisco VNMC GUI, if the virtual data center DC1 is under the tenant and the application APP1 is under DC1, the vnsp app1-sp in the APP1 level is pointing to the policy set ps1 at the DC level.

Figure 6-1 shows the Cisco VNMC GUI organization structure.

Figure 6-1 Cisco VNMC Organizational Hierarchy for a Tenant, Data Center, and Application

The output of the show running-config command shows that the policy set and its objects are resolved from the APP1 level where the security profile is defined. The actual location of the objects in the Cisco VNMC GUI is at the DC1 level.

The policy object DNs that are shown in the Cisco VSG show running-config command output are shown with a DN relative to where they are resolved from. The policy object DNs are not where the actual policy objects are in the Cisco VNMC organizational hierarchy.

However, security-profiles are shown with the DN where the actual security profile is created on the Cisco VNMC organizational hierarchy.

Policy objects are resolved upwards from where the security-profile is located in the Cisco VNMC organizational hierarchy.

EXAMPLE

In the following example, the VSG is configured with the following specifications:

• The security profile (VNSP) sp1 has policy-set ps1 in which there is a policy p1 that includes a rule, r1.
• The policy-set ps1 is located at root in the organization tree on the Cisco VNMC.
• The policy p1 is located at root in the organization tree on the Cisco VNMC.
• The rule r1 is placed in the policy p1 on the Cisco VNMC (the Cisco VNMC does not allow you to create a rule object in and of itself).
• The security profile sp1 is placed in tenant_d3337/dc1 on the VNMC.

All Cisco VSGs in the tenant_d3337 have the following show-running config command output (this configuration is replicated to all Cisco VSGs in the leaf path):

Note The policy objects above do not actually exist at the DC1 level of the organization tree on the Cisco VNMC, but are resolved from that location in the Cisco VNMC organization tree.

BEFORE YOU BEGIN

Before beginning this procedure, you must do or know the following:

• Your Cisco VSG software must be operating with three network adapters. Assign the network labels as follows:

– Service (Eth0) as your port profile

– Mgmt (Eth1) as your management VLAN

– HA (Eth2) as your port profile

See the Cisco Virtual Security Gateway, Release 4.2(1)VSG1(1) and Cisco Virtual Network Management Center, Release 1.0.1 Installation Guide for details about assigning network labels to the network adapters.

• You have the Cisco VSG VM powered on and the data interface IP (for data0) and management interface IP configured.

SUMMARY STEPS

1. configure

2. service-firewall logging enable

3. logging monitor level

4. (Optional) copy running-config startup-config

5. exit

DETAILED STEPS