Need 1Gbit ethernet hub

[seeker169]

Hopefully I've found my way to the right forum...  

I need a 1Gbit ethernet hub. Not a switch or a router, but a hub. I have searched and searched and cannot find such a beast and was hoping you all might know of one.

We're connecting our network to some one else's network -- there's 1 input pipe and we need two outputs -- and they freaked when they heard we were going to use a switch. A hub is okay, but not a switch. There are supposedly security as well as technical issues involved here, so if "they" say it's got to be a hub, it's got to be a hub.

And if all my wishes were to be granted, it would take SC multimode fiber inputs, but copper would be just fine. I have plenty of media converters.

Cat

(cross-posted here)

[altenbach]

Can you explain the security issues? Typically a hub is much less secure because it does not segment traffic: anything that comes in at one of the ports gets broadcast to all other ports. For that reason, hubs are half-duplex by design. My best guess is that a 1Gb hub does not exist.

What are the "techincal issues"? This request makes absolutely no sense.

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seeker169 wrote: 

We're connecting our network to some one else's network -- there's 1 input pipe and we need two outputs -- and they freaked when they heard we were going to use a switch.

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To connect different networks, you need to go above layer 2.

So you you have three ports. One for each network. What goes on the third port?

Message Edited by altenbach on 06-17-2010 06:43 AM

[seeker169]

I wish I could explain the security/technical issues.  All I've gotten out of anyone is so far is some mumbling about network spanning.

I know traffic on a hub isn't segmented -- that's one of the reasons we wanted to use a switch.

And sadly, in my world (Dept of Defense) things don't necessarily have to make any technical sense for them to be "true".

[seeker169]

I finally figured out how to quote...

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altenbach wrote:

To connect different networks, you need to go above layer 2.

So you you have three ports. One for each network. What goes on the third port?

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There is data from two different sources coming over the single 1Gb fiber we have available to us.  On our end, we have two boxes, each with a different IP address on their network, 1 for each type of data.  So it's not even an issue of connecting two different networks.  It's just an issue of us needing 2 separate feeds for our two boxes

[Intaris]

I would imagine that a device connected to a hub would see ALL of the traffic which ANY of the other devices is seeing, thus allowing full monitoring of the traffic.

I can't imagine any other aspect would increase security....

Shane.

[RavensFan]

I thought that any switch or router of any quality could be configured with the lower security settings needed to act as a "dumb" hub.  That you can turn off things like port forwarding and network segments and stuff like that and just allow it to pass all traffic anywhere.

[altenbach]

Managed switches can sometimes be assigned a monitoring port. However, the aggregated speed of a switch is much higher than any if the individual ports can achieve. For example if you have a 8 port switch, 1&2, 3&4, 5&6 can each pairwise communicate at the same time at 1Gb/s in each direction (total of 6GB/s), however, the monitoring port is capped at 1GB/s. To monitor all, traffic needs to be severely throttled.

[PhillipBrooks]

If "they" won't let you have a switch, maybe "they" can specify and/or provide a router that "they" configure to their security requirements.

You need to talk to the ISSM or ISSO. If "they" are"them" 😛 then maybe you can look for some relief by reffering to NISPOM 8-502; Periods Processing and/or 8-504; Tactical, Embedded, Data-Acquisition, and Special-Purpose Systems.

If your can select and document a switch that has no non-volatile memory (or that can be sanitized), maybe you can use it...