The Internet Encyclopedia (Volume 3)

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Virtual ̇Private WL040/Bidgolio-Vol I WL040-Sample.cls August 14, 2003 17:53 Char Count= 0

GLOSSARY 589

ANX

TP

ANX

TP

ANX

IPsec TP

CSP

Public

Internet

CSP

CSP

CEPO

ANX

Overseer

IPsec

IPsec

CASP

ANX

Extranet

Figure 11: ANX extranet architecture.

Example of Deployment of a

Customer-Edge-Based Virtual Private

Networks in E-commerce

Unless your enterprise is the first to try a new techno-

logy, protocol, or architecture, there will likely be case

studies available for review. A frequently documented ex-

tranet case study is the Automotive Network eXchange

(ANX) (McDysan, 2000). This extranet VPN involves a

few large enterprises (automotive manufacturers) and a

significant number of small-to-medium-size enterprises

(their suppliers). Initiated by the Automotive Industry Ac-

tion Group (AIAG) in 1994, the IPsec-based ANX network

had Chrysler, Ford, and General Motors as the founding

network participants. These companies and other major

automotive manufacturers utilize parts and services from

a large number of common original equipment manufac-

turers, such as Bosch, Delta, Fisher, ITT, and TRW. Follow-

ing the completion of successful trials in 1997 and 1998,

ANX launched production in November 1998. By the end

of 1999, ANX had nearly 500 registered trading partners.

As an example of a quantifiable goal achievable by an ex-

tranet, the AIAG estimates that a collaborative planning,

forecasting, and replacement tool running over the ANX

network may save up to $1,200 per vehicle. This savings

results from a reduction of the delivery cycle of parts and

supplies and the associated inventory levels.

The ANX architecture is based upon a set of in-

terconnected certified service providers (CSPs), certified

exchange point operators (CEPOs), and certificate author-

ity service providers to which ANX trading partners sub-

scribe, as illustrated in Figure 11. Telcordia (formerly Bell-

core) has been chosen as the ANX overseer, which awards

certification to CSPs and CEPOs. The ANX service qual-

ity certification categories are network service features,

interoperability, performance, reliability, business conti-

nuity and disaster recovery, security, customer care, and

trouble handling. ANX has also specified that the Interna-

tional Computer Security Association (ICSA) will certify

whether equipment is IPsec compliant.

Finding companies with equipment that has the ICSA

stamp of approval is a good place to start when looking

for IPsec-compliant vendors.

This network is effectively a partitioned set of inter-

faces running on top of the public Internet infrastructure

offered by the selected set of certified commercial ISPs. It

replaces the prior complex arrangement of physical and

logical connections between trading partners with one

logically administered, cryptographically secured connec-

tion to the ANX extranet. Choice of the TCP/IP protocol

suite provides access to a broad range of file transfer,

electronic document interchange, e-mail, and other ap-

plication software. This is especially important in the au-

tomotive industry, where computer-based techniques are

now used in almost every stage of the design, manufac-

turing, delivery, and maintenance aspects of the business.

Although the benefits of ANX apply primarily to medium-

to-large-size enterprises in the automotive industry, the

drive toward interoperability will benefit other industry

segments in the longer term (for more information, see

http://www.anx.com).

GLOSSARY

Customer-edge (CE) device Provides access for users

at a site and has an access connection to a PE device. It

allows users at a site to communicate over the access

network with other sites in the VPN.

Enterprise A single organization, corporation, or gov-

ernment agency that administratively controls and sets

policy for communication among a set of sites.

Extranet Allows communication between a set of sites

that belong to different enterprises, as controlled by

the enterprise administrators and/or a third party.

These enterprises have access to a specified subset

of each other’s sites. Examples of extranets include

(a) companies performing joint software develop-

ment, (b) a group of suppliers and their customers

exchanging orders and delivery tracking informa-

tion, and (c) different organizations participating in

a consortium that has access to important informa-

tion.

Generic routing encapsulation (GRE) A general pro-

tocol for encapsulating a network layer protocol over

another network layer protocol (RFC 2784, Farinacci,

Li, Hanks, Meyer, & Traina, 2000).