Hardware bypass, (also known as fail-to-wire) is a physical layer (Layer 1) bypass that allows paired interfaces to go into bypass mode so that the hardware forwards packets between these port pairs without software intervention. Hardware bypass provides network connectivity when there are software or hardware failures. Hardware bypass is useful on ports where the Firepower security appliance is only monitoring or logging traffic. The hardware bypass network modules have an optical switch that is capable of connecting the two ports when needed.
