4.5.1 KVM virtual networks

In virtual networks Elastic Cloud KVM NAT (Network Address Translation) technologies are used.

NAT benefits:

One IP address supports recourses on multiple virtual servers,
Virtual network redirection management occurs in a single interface,
NAT improves security due to an opportunity to use non-standard ports,
Renting one IP address is cheaper than multiple IP addresses.

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If you have a web server and a mail server in your virtual network and the connection to them goes via a single public IP address, NAT uses network ports to distinguish traffic.

Web traffic that normally uses port 80 or 443 will be redirected to the web server, and web traffic that normally uses port 25 will be redirected to the mail server.

There are two types of NAT available in the Elastic Cloud KVM virtual networks:

Classic incoming NAT rules specify the way the incoming traffic will be redirected:

from which network ports of the external IP address,

to which internal IP addresses and their ports.
Static NAT is applied to a maximum of one VM inside one virtual network,

incoming traffic to the external IP address is redirected to the VM ports of the same name with enabled Static NAT.