Know the Human-like Functions of Routers in your Network – they’re unbelievable
Not all routers are created equal. Why? Routers vary with specs, with design, with supported networking protocols, with scalability features, with LAN IP address, with WAN IP address, with software, and so on and so forth. Why did I introduce routers this way? First, routers can a do a lot of things other than connecting your computers and devices to the internet - via the modem. However, you have to explore the processes on how to configure them properly in accordance with your network requirements. In other words, you have to tell the router exactly what to do. Second, routers are sometimes too complicated to understand because it blends with modem, hubs and switches physically and virtually. When two geeks are talking loud inside the cafeteria and someone says “we’re under DoS attack”, not only the servers are in big trouble, but more probably the routers too.
What are the functions of a router? Router can function as a traffic officer, a middle man, a path finder, and a police officer, and even more than that. Allow me to expand on that.
The primary role of routers is to forward data packets along networks (internet, WAN, LAN, sub-network). These data packets (containing information) are routed to the packet-switching network using protocols like TCP/IP. As a traffic officer, router uses a configuration or routing table to know exactly where these data packets should go – the exact IP address of the device. Imagine the router in the middle of an intersection of four LAN networks. Since it exactly knows the LAN IP address and the device IP address, it will direct the data packets to turn left, turn right or go straight towards its destination.
Large routers on huge commercial buildings and factories have heavier tasks compared to those that are at home networks. As a middle man, it links one WAN to another WAN, LAN to another LAN, or WAN to a LAN where complex protocols are in place – particularly security protocols. A router can reconfigure the paths of data packets within these networks by taking into consideration various parameters including line condition, delays in sending and receiving data and traffic, and amount of data packets. A mechanism called “subnet mask” is being enforced by the router within a sub network to ensure that data packets won’t go out of that network. This process is being carried out by using addressing schemes or logical addresses.
All devices, including the router itself, have distinct logical addresses. A network device has physical address, IP address, subnet mask, default gateway, DHCP server and MAC address. The reason for having these logical addresses is because of networking protocols. For example, if you print a page of document from your smartphone to your printer device at home, the Internet Printing Protocol (IPP) will handle this printing job. In this instance, the router acts as a path finder between your smartphone and the printer by finding the best possible route in the public packet-switched network – or the internet network.
You could have already encountered emails that “bounce back”. Any idea why this happens? If you’re thinking that an “anti-spamming” protocol is set on the recipient’s mail server, then you got it right. Actually, that’s just one of the many reasons. Other reasons could be network failure, the non-existence of the email address to where you sent the message, and just like what I’ve mentioned earlier, it could be due to a Denial of Service (DoS) attack. A router, on such cases, can be the police officer. It will intentionally bounce back the email to its sender. DoS happens when bad hackers send millions of data packets to a certain server (web or mail) up to a point wherein the routers can no longer handle the massive number of packets. Even if there are other routers within the server network to accommodate these packets, the continuous inflow of packets will cause these routers to clog. So if you’re one of the unlucky email senders when the server is under attack, your email will bounce back – a denial of service. The routers on this case are police officers under siege.
