A reverse proxy in Fortigate acts as a gateway between your internal network and the outside world, protecting your servers and applications from direct internet access. It acts as a middleman, receiving requests from the internet and forwarding them to the appropriate servers on your internal network.
Here's how it works:
- Client request: A user on the internet makes a request to a website hosted on your internal network.
- Fortigate receives the request: The request is sent to the Fortigate firewall, which acts as the reverse proxy.
- Fortigate forwards the request: The Fortigate firewall forwards the request to the appropriate server on your internal network.
- Server response: The server processes the request and sends a response back to the Fortigate firewall.
- Fortigate returns the response: The Fortigate firewall returns the response to the client on the internet.
Benefits of using a reverse proxy in Fortigate:
- Security: It hides your internal servers from the internet, making them less vulnerable to attacks.
- Performance: It can cache frequently accessed content, reducing server load and improving website speed.
- Load balancing: It can distribute traffic across multiple servers, ensuring that no single server is overloaded.
- Centralized management: You can manage all of your reverse proxy settings from a single location, simplifying administration.
Examples of reverse proxy use cases in Fortigate:
- Web server protection: Protecting your web servers from direct internet access.
- Application load balancing: Distributing traffic across multiple application servers.
- SSL termination: Decrypting SSL traffic before forwarding it to your internal servers.
- Content caching: Caching frequently accessed content to improve website performance.
Setting up a reverse proxy in Fortigate:
- Configure a virtual IP address: Create a virtual IP address on your Fortigate firewall that will act as the public-facing address for your reverse proxy.
- Create a virtual server: Create a virtual server on your Fortigate firewall that will listen for incoming requests on the virtual IP address.
- Configure the virtual server settings: Specify the port, protocol, and the backend server to which the requests should be forwarded.
- Enable SSL termination (optional): If you want to terminate SSL traffic at the Fortigate firewall, you will need to configure an SSL certificate.
By utilizing a reverse proxy in Fortigate, you can enhance your network security, boost website performance, and simplify server management.
