Using a Load Balancer as a Free Reverse Proxy
DownloadFree LoadMaster is ideally suited to deployments that require a reverse proxy to sit in front of resources such as web servers, Microsoft Exchange and Lync servers. In addition to the basic proxying function, LoadMaster can be used to manage traffic, to increase performance and to add additional layers of security.
Managing Traffic
As a reverse proxy, LoadMaster includes the capability to forward traffic to multiple servers and to balance the traffic between these servers (Load Balancing). Intelligently forwarding traffic to more than one server opens up many ways to improve service uptime as application resilience can be implemented by deploying multiple servers behind the LoadMaster acting as a reverse proxy. This allows web services to scale by adding (or removing) application servers to match demand without any change to public DNS entries or edge firewalls.
Reverse Proxy Security
The reverse proxy is also the logical place in the network to apply a security layer to the backend server infrastructure. As a reverse proxy, a LoadMaster may ensure all traffic is encrypted and also identify and block suspicious traffic with a Web Application Firewall (WAF). The WAF feature allows the proxy administrator to configure custom rules that will identify and block attacks from reaching the servers.
Using a Reverse Proxy for Encryption Offload
Securing traffic using TLS can create significant additional processor workload on servers. To reduce this SSL enccryption overhead, the LoadMaster can take this workload off the backend servers and perform the required encryption and decryption while acting as a reverse proxy.
Content caching on a Reverse Proxy
LoadMaster can cache content locally and reply to client requests driectly without the need to forward to a server. Caching content on the reverse proxy platform reduces the load on the server and leads to a better user experience as the load balancer cache serves client requests more efficiently.
More than just Web traffic
Reverse proxies can be deployed with workloads other that http applications. Microsoft Lync requires a reverse proxy to enable subscriber access to services. LoadMaster as a proxy server for Lync enhances the security and performance by offloading security processing and protecting the internal Lync topology.