How do I share my data securely to PC's without VPN

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Level 1

4 points

How do I share my data securely to PC's without VPN

We have a snow leopard server with a load of our company data on it. We use VPN so our mac users can get at that data without problems. I am yet to get any PC users succesfully connected to the mac vpn service. Does anyone know another way?

In my head the ideal would be a web page they could go to and put in their login and it shows the folder structure on that web page. I actually dont mind if the PC users had only read only access. I could set it up as a port forward on my firewall to the server, therefore bypassing the vpn.

Mac OS X (10.6.7)

Posted on Oct 26, 2012 2:26 AM

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Answer 1

Oct 26, 2012 7:54 AM in response to andrewrob

I prefer to use a VPN server implemented in a gateway-firewall box, and not VPN pass-through.

There's any number of things that can go wrong with a pass-through VPN, unfortunately.

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Answer 2

andrewrob Author

Level 1

4 points

Oct 26, 2012 8:06 AM in response to MrHoffman

which box do you use?

I have used VPN passthrough for many many years with mac users and never had a problem.

Can you use the mac built in VPN client with Netgear VPN boxes?

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Answer 3

Oct 26, 2012 11:21 AM in response to andrewrob

More often than not, I end up working with whatever box the client had ordered. Recently, that's been D-Link, Cisco, Cisco/Linksys, Fortigate, and a few others.

Check the vendor's documentation for details. And whether something works usually involves at least some local testing; figuring out whether the documentation matches reality.

The last Netgear I worked with was a problem with establishing a VPN from OS X, but it was unclear if that was due to the specific set-up of that box, or the Netgear implementation; I wasn't working on the Netgear box there, but on some other hardware.

If I go looking for boxes, my preference is to look for a vendor that does not require the installation of client software, and that (obviously, preferably) lists OS X as supported.

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