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- What will be the main use for NetFlow?

- Is real-time reporting or historical reporting more important?

- Is it  traffic analysis including application and user monitoring?

- How much are you willing to pay for the product?

- Do your switches/routers support NetFlow?

- Is scalability a concern?

Read more »

Visit our website to download a 30 day trial of Scrutinizer

Join the NetFlow Developments group on LinkedIn.

You probably have NetFlow enabled on your network devices, but the question is, are you truly taking advantage of what it offers? From working in technical support, I noticed, although NetFlow technology is evolving rapidly, when it comes to understanding how the technology works and how much can be accomplish with it, many users are staying behind. Today I want to give you a few tips. Read more »

Visit our website to download a 30 day trial of Scrutinizer

Join the NetFlow Developments group on LinkedIn.

Today I want to talk, in a nutshell, about the advantages of NetFlow. One thing in particular that distinguishes NetFlow based traffic monitoring from the traditional SNMP dependent systems is the ability to characterize traffic applications and patterns. Knowing what the traffic is, who it is from, how and where it flows is critical for network performance and troubleshooting. For instance, it helps Network managers “determine where to apply QoS, optimize resource usage and it plays a vital role in network security to detect Denial-of-Service (DoS) attacks, network-propagated worms, and other undesirable network events.”

In planning, as I previously stated, NetFlow information ensures that resources are used adequately in support of organizational goals. Moreover, it facilitates solutions to many common network issues including: Read more »

Visit our website to download a 30 day trial of Scrutinizer

Join the NetFlow Developments group on LinkedIn.

The other day my colleagues at the technical support desk and I were talking about different aspects of network analysis and an interesting question came up:

When you use a NetFlow collecting appliance, what function do you use more, the reporting or the behavior analysis function?

Between all of us, we couldn’t come up with a definitive answer.

At Plixer, we have designed our NetFlow and sFlow Analysis Tool to provide the best custom reporting engine on the market today, supporting leading edge technologies like the Cisco ASA, Flexible NetFlow, IPFIX, and NBAR. With a single mouse click you can select from over 20 predefined report filters. Anything from top hosts, applications, and conversations, to traffic volume and flow volume reports.

But it gets better!

We are soon to be releasing Scrutinizer v8. Version 8 includes a number of new report filters including a dashboard report that lets you see a number of different reports for an interface on a single view.

Scrutinizer with Flow Analytics is one of the few NetFlow and sFlow solutions that combines network traffic analysis with continuous network behavior monitoring.

The Flow Analytics function within Scrutinizer includes dozens of algorithms that detect malware such as botnets, worms, and other threats. It interrogates every flow from your exporting devices for suspicious traffic patterns and anomalies. All flows across selected flow sending devices are monitored at all times. While antivirus solutions help catch infections on computers, Flow Analytics looks for problems that are already underway (e.g. DDoS, network scans, nefarious activity, etc.) on the internal network.

The Flow Expert view on the MyView tab lets you see what’s going on across your network on a single dashboard view. The Threats Overview gadget shows you a count of the occurrences that have been found for each algorithm, and a click on the alarm takes you directly to the Alarm tab to view the details for that particular alert.

Since we are in the election season I figured that I would pass the question on to you.

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If you are looking for a new network traffic analysis tool, or have any questions about Scrutinizer, give me a call – (207)324-8805

-Scott

Best at NetFlow solutions should provide value way beyond NetFlow Reporting.  As a leader in Flexible NetFlow analysis we recognized this need years ago when we put together the architecture  for Flow Analytics.  Most people use a NetFlow Analyzer to look for problems when someone calls with a connection issue. Read more »

Why do you want to know what is going on in the traffic flow of a network?

What’s the point?

Why doesn’t utilization alone cut it?

Network Administrators don’t typically have a lot of time on a day-to-day basis. There is always some fire to fight, some network or user issue that comes up. Most times your juggling more than one issue at a time. So you find yourself spending most of your time trying to keep the network running and the users happy.

A Network Administrator’s abilities are only as good as his awareness of what happens on his network.

Monitoring and maintaining your network traffic and bandwidth utilization used to be an overlooked aspect of your job. But evolution of technology has changed the makeup of networks everywhere and has forced network managers to include Flow analysis and monitoring in their network management strategies.

Network Flow Analysis is the art of studying the traffic on a computer network. It is the  industry-standard method of collecting and recording network traffic. Flow analysis lets you see what types of traffic passed between hosts, without having to reproduce the problem.

Read more »

The other day I took an interesting call from a customer who was concerned because he was suddenly seeing his flows per second count almost double. He had just upgraded his Scrutinizer NetFlow and sFlow traffic analysis application to the latest version and he thought that maybe something had changed to cause this to happen.

I assured him that nothing in the Scrutinizer upgrade would have caused him to see his flow count increase. And after talking with him, I learned that he had also just upgraded the IOS on his routers.

Were we looking at some kind of a ”perfect storm“ scenario?

Of course not!

Read more »

Consider this – customer calls in and says that a workstation on his network was scanning their entire corporate network and how can he be alerted on this type of behavior? The behavior wasn’t exactly malicious, but rather that someone had installed an inventory application on their desktop  which scanned their entire network with snmp scans.

So, no, it wasn’t malicious activity, but that sort of network monitoring also was not authorized for that individual on their network.

Using Scrutinizer NetFlow and sFlow Analyzer, he asked how he could detect that sort of network traffic.
Read more »

The following article, “Scrutinizer Brings Flow Analytics to SMBs“, written by David Diaz, was recently featured on TechCrunchIT.

David points out that with the low initial cost for Scrutinizer NetFlow & sFlow Analyzer, it is a very affordable Flow Analytics solution for small and medium-sized businesses.

This flow analysis tool can also be deployed centrally and accessed globally via the web interface.  What this means is that one install of Scrutinizer can provide network management information for your entire network and accessible by everyone on the network management team, regardless of geographical location.

Read more »