My personal network setup, multi-part series

It has been almost half a year since I last blogged. It is time to brush off the cobwebs and start blogging! There are many ways to implement network security monitoring at home. My personal network is just one way to setup NSM in a home environment.

Wax on, wax off. 

Before eagerly buying equipment and getting hands on keyboard, general architecture and considerations need to be made. First, understand your environment and needs.

Some considerations

Where do you want visibility in your home network?  

What are your ingress/egress points?

How do most endpoints get to the internet?

Are there specific digital assets you want to gain network visibility?

Many home networks likely consist of one device that serves as the modem, switch, and wireless router. For example, this Actiontec device is usually used by Verizon FIOS customers has a router and wireless router all wrapped into one appliance.

When having a combined network gateway, you need to consider how and if you are going to monitor endpoints that connect wirelessly. If you have one of these all-in-one devices and ISP router serves as the default gateway for both wired and wireless traffic, then you will have a blindspot in your visibility of endpoints connecting to the wireless router. This is because there is no way to place an NSM solution inline before the ISP router. 

For my network architecture, I have another switch with port mirroring enabled connected to the network gateway, then I have setup a wireless access point off the additional switch. 

Stay tuned while I make another post about setting up a network tap.