NAC Planning

There are certain questions which need to be answered before the deployment of NAC takes place. 

There are certain criteria the customer should closely examine regarding the NAC solution and the NAC vendors before they are selected.

What are the reasons for your NAC consideration?

1. Must understand what NAC adds to their existing solutions before they consider it.
2. Must understand the solution and perform a cost and benefit evaluation before hand.
3. Can NAC be implemented using existing and complementary solutions.

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Where in your network are you planning to sit the NAC solution and Why?

Here are few examples of where NAC can be installed:

• At the point of entry :Switch or VPN device.
• At a deeper security layer: Firewall .
• At the perimeter: Remote Access.
• Within the core network: Routers.
• Multiple NAC enforcement points can be installed depending on the customer’s needs.

Are you planning to make use of existing security solutions in your network?

The answer should be absolutely.  Here is some consideration you need to share with the NAC vendor

1. How can NAC solution make use of IPS and IDS systems installed in your network (if any)?
2. How can NAC solution make use of vulnerability scanners already existing in your system (if any)?
3. How can NAC solution best utilize firewalls, routers and switches installed in your network (if any)?
4. How can NAC solution make your security tools smarter by sharing information about users in your network?
5. How can NAC solution make use of your Identity Management solution (if any)?
6. How can NAC solution utilize Microsoft’s NAP (Network Access Protection)?

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What are the steps you are planning to take to ensure that the installation and deployment of NAC solution will not cause any interruption or problems to your existing network?

Here are some points you need to consider:

Network Access Control (NAC) is a solution desired by many customers to secure their end point before the end point attempts to get company network access. NAC enforces policies on end points set by the customer. If the endpoint meets policy requirements, the endpoint then gets access to the network, if it does not, the endpoint is quarantined. The system can then attempt to apply patches and solutions to bring the endpoint to the policies.

Some customers are clearly confused about NAC and what solution to implement: Agentless or Agent solution, Appliance bases solution or Software based solution, out of band or Inline solution and so on. Here are some of the consultation topics we helped one of our customers understand before actually implementing the NAC solution. FNG engineers completed a NAC project in Saudi Arabia in 2009.

Questions to Direct to your NAC Vendor

The following is a sample of a list of questions which should be directed to the NAC vendor solution provider: