We are looking at deploying an application on azure web sites and deploying a redis and solr clusters on sets of azure virtual machines. What is the best practise for restricting access so just my azure web site can access these boxes?
We store private information in the redis and solr cluster so cannot risk allowing other azure websites access to the redis and solr clusters so allowing the complete IP range of the azure data centres is a no go.
Azure Web Sites do not have dedicated outbound IP addresses for each deployment. This precludes you from using ACLs or Virtual Networks to connect to your Redis / Solr virtual machines.
While you can filter IP traffic entering a Virtual Machine via ACL, this will only work with Cloud Services (web/worker roles) and Virtual Machines. Likewise, you can add Cloud Services and Virtual Machines to a Virtual Network, allowing you to directly access your Redis/Solr instances.
As #Itamar mentioned in his answer, you can use IP filtering on the Redis/Solr instances themselves, via the OS or within Redis/Solr as supported. You can also use an SSL connection.
Don't know about solr, but if you want a secure connection to your Redis you should consider using a secure proxy such stunnel on the website and the Redis servers (see for example http://bencane.com/2014/02/18/sending-redis-traffic-through-an-ssl-tunnel-with-stunnel)... or, just use a Redis service provider that supports SSL (e.g. http://redislabs.com ;)).
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We are setting up SQL Always On in Azure VM (IAAS). We followed the steps given in Configure Always On Availability Group in Azure VM manually and the setup is working fine. Since the setup is using the internal load balancer, the listener is available only internally i.e. using a jump box. We are using NSGs to restrict access to the servers from our office IPs and allow access to the SQL Servers from developer machines. This works for direct access to the individual SQL server but not via listener. What can be done to allow access from outside of the VNET?
This subscription is standalone and not connected to the on-premise via site-to-site VPN or Express Route. The resources should be accessed using internet and source IPs are specifically white listed (it is a very small fixed list).
You can configure a Point-to-Site connection to allow your clients to connect the Azure VNet then use sql server.
Yes, the solution to which is to use a Point-to-Site with a VPN gateway deployed.
But, keep in mind that you can have a max of 128 users.
Apart from which, P2S should do the trick here.
I have created a Virtual Network, when deploying a VM in it, it's unavailable from Internet, and available when I connect via VPN. (And that's what it's supposed to do).
But when I deploy a Cloud Service (and the Cloud Service is correctly deployed in the Virtual Network as I can see it in the VN resources list), it's still available from Internet.
How can I secure the access of a Cloud Service ? I don't want it to be accessible by every one, just by VPN and from dedicated IPs.
Finally I found that by default Cloud Services have EndPoints configured. By adding ACLs to it (http://blogs.msdn.com/b/walterm/archive/2014/04/22/windows-azure-paas-acls-are-here.aspx) I can isolate them into the Virtual Network.
If you do not want the cloud service to be accessible from the Internet, the better way to protect is to remove the endpoints. If you want to ACL the instances at the Virtual Network/Subnet level consider using this article
We are planning to rent have two VMs (one for Web Server and another for Database server) on Azure. I would like to know what would be the best way to communicate Database server from web server.
Direct communication using DNS.
Keep both the VMs in Cloud service and use host name to communicate.
Form a virtual network and use the persistent virtual machine IP address to connect to.
Thanks In Advance
you don't want to use the Clud Service host name to communicate between the VMs.
If you want to use DNS, you have to provide DNS - you don't need that too.
For that particular scenario, I would recommend something even simpler:
Put the VMs in the same Cloud service
Do not go for any Virtual Network or DNS Solutions
Use VM Name to connect between the machines.
when the VMs are deployed in the same Cloud Service and not in Virtual Network, Windows Azure provides automatic name discovery. The simplest approach is usually the best.
For more information on name resolution scenarios in Windows Azure, read this paper.
I have an Azure Cloud Service (Worker Role) that needs to connect to my Azure SQL database and also connect to an external database.
In development the external database was on the public Internet and connectivity was not a problem.
However, the solution now needs to be deployed in a production environment and access to the external database is to be restricted by setting up a Virtual Network.
The Cloud Service, when deployed in the Virtual Network, gets an IP from the subnet, but seems to become inaccessible to the outside world, and is not connecting to the Azure SQL database (I also cannot RDP to it).
This seems to be beyond my level of understanding of networking, but I don't see why it should lose access to its neighbours in the Azure environment.
What am I missing? Do I need to get involved with Endpoints? Is the Virtual Network misconfigured?
Thanks in advance.
Your question is quite vague, in terms that it does describe the whole picture in the best possible way. Let me put my answer based on my understanding about your issue.
First of all - Azure virtual Network is Virtual Network. It is designed to enable secure cross-premisses connectivity with Windows Azure Data Center.
When you deploy a proper PaaS Cloud Service (Worker Role / Web Role) in a Virtual Network, the role instances get IP Addresses allocated from the defined DHCP pool (the VNet Definition).
When you deploy any service in an Azure Virtual Network you have to take care of Name Resolution! Meaning that, if you do not provide a proper DNS Server, your cloud instances will not be able to resolve any address. That includes Azure SQL Database servers. More on Name Resolution can be read here.
Next, but not less important - Azure SQL Database servers are not part of, and, as of March'2013, cannot be added to Azure Virtual Network!
The last statement means that in order for your Worker Role to access Azre SQL Database server, you need to provide a proper DNS server in your Azure Virtual Network.
And lastly, when you deploy a PaaS service into a Virtual Network, in order to access it via Remote Desktop need to:
* Properly enable and configure RDP extension. it will anyway create Input Endpoint. But this is the only way to enable RDP on PaaS right now;
* You could probably enable RDP via PowerShell startup script and access RDP via the VPN tunnel for the Virtual Network - say you configured a Site-to-Site or Point-to-site VPN for your Azure VNet.
Check the building cross-premises Virtual Network guide here.
How to create 2 connected virtual machines in Windows Azure to be able to deploy Two-Tier-Architecture solution ?
Let me clarify the scenario, Currently I am using 1 virtual machines in Windows Azure where I have the SQL Server 2008 DB installed AND the ASP.NET solution.
However, I want to create a very simple Two-Tier-Architecture where the SQL Server 2008 DB is installed on Server1, and the ASP.NET solution is deployed on Server2.
So, How to accomplish that? I mean, How to connected those two separate virtual machines? And how they can work together to run one single solution?
Could you please help me out in this scenario ?
Thanks !
Seems like a lot of attention being given to Virtual Networks. That's fine, but... if all you're trying to do is create a multi-tier app with a handful of VMs working in conjunction with each other, you can simply create multiple VMs within the same cloud service (that is, they all live in xyz.cloudapp.net).
They'll all sit behind a single public IP address, but consider your case where you have a web server and a database server:
Expose ports 80 and 443 specifically for the web server(s) (you can have multiple, and load-balance the ports across these VMs
Don't expose any public ports for the database server
Once deployed to the same cloud service, each VM in the cloud service can talk directly to any other VM in the cloud service, using the host name you assigned to it.
You can also deploy your web and database tiers to different cloud services, and still communicate between them without a Virtual Network. If you open, say, port 1433 on your database server, now your web tier can simply open a connection to yourdb.cloudapp.net:1433. Of course, this means the entire world can do the same, but... you can apply an endpoint ACL (access control list) on yourdb.cloudapp.net port 1433, and allow only the public VIP of your web tier's cloud service.
You'd need a Virtual Network if your web and database tiers are in separate cloud services and you don't want any exposed ports on your data tier, and you don't want to go through the built-in load balancer.
You should utilise Virtual Networking (http://www.windowsazure.com/en-us/services/virtual-network/). Additionally you can configure the two machines as part of a single Cloud Service to ensure they are encapsulated together and available publicly via a single cloudapp.net address. Note that to benefit from the Azure SLA you should run two instances of each tier (web / DB).
Note that you can't add an existing VM to a new Virtual Network.
You can create a virtual network and then add both servers in the same network if they are on different cloud services (which is the default when using quick create). But you can't do this to servers that have been created so you will need to detach your disks create 2 new servers in the new network and then reattach your disks to the new servers.
If you are planning on using a DC then create 2 subnets in your virtual network and put your DC in one and the servers in the other as you don't want your DC getting a different IP.