Q: How does the VPN security of the OS X Server compare to a VPN router?
How does the VPN security of the OS X Server compare to a VPN router?
Anyone know?
Mac OS X (10.7.5)
Posted on Apr 27, 2014 11:25 AM
CCSMG wrote:
Thanks John,
Do you know if either the Apple OS X Server, Strongswan or OpenVPN provide encription of the data during transfer? I'm not that knowledgable on the subject so may be an obvious answer to those in the know.
All VPN servers no matter what type provide encryption of data during transfer, it is pretty much their sole reason for existing. The differences are how strong the encryption is and perhaps even more importantly how secure the initial connection negotiation is. It is therefore the case that StrongSwan and OpenVPN can be configured in such a way that is more secure than Apple's VPN server.
Note: You will also typically need to use an alternative VPN client to Apple's in order to benefit from the stronger VPN server capabilities of StrongSwan and OpenVPN. There is a free OpenVPN client available for OS X and iOS and if you go for a commercial VPN solution like Cisco you would use their Cisco AnyConnect client. You can use the built-in Cisco IPSec client to connect to StrongSwan but you then only get some of the benefits, you do get to use Certificates but not IKE v2.
Posted on Apr 28, 2014 6:38 AM