topic Re: 802.1X Deployment for VM configured on Esxi - in Network Access Control

802.1X Deployment for VM configured on Esxi -

RAMAN AZIZIAN — Mon, 21 Apr 2025 13:46:51 GMT

Good day,

I have a task to research, design, and implement NAC (802.1X) for wired network, and I wanted to find out if the servers in the data center also need to be configured for NAC authentication. We have a large compute/storage/virtualization datacenter and i can't seem to find info regarding best practice for the datacenter side.

I am planning on implementing PEAP for our client/user access, and possibly EAP-TLS.

Network topology consist of cisco switches (IOS, NxOS), ISE, Active Directory, and CA.

Any info or suggestions as always will be greatly appreciated.

All the best and thank you!

Re: 802.1X Deployment for VM configured on Esxi -

Rob Ingram — Mon, 21 Apr 2025 13:50:56 GMT

@RAMAN AZIZIAN no, typically you would not use NAC (802.1X/MAB) on servers in the DC. NAC is for authenticating endpoints connected to access layer switches.

I would recommend using EAP-TLS (maybe TEAP with EAP-TLS) for authentication.

Re: 802.1X Deployment for VM configured on Esxi -

RAMAN AZIZIAN — Mon, 21 Apr 2025 13:59:32 GMT

Thank you Rob for the quick reply. We are also being tasked with deploying of Zero-Trust infrastrcuture, and I was curious if that needed to be applied on the VMs as well. I have long ways to go to fully understand all the components.

Have a great day.

raman