Azure - Front Door

Introduction

• Azure Front Door is a global, scalable, and secure entry point for fast delivery of your web applications.
• It offers features such as global load balancing, enhanced performance, and comprehensive security for your web applications.

Key Features of Azure Front Door

1. Global Load Balancing:
   • Distributes incoming traffic across multiple backend regions to improve availability and responsiveness.
2. Application Acceleration:
   • Uses edge POPs (Points of Presence) to cache content and accelerate dynamic content delivery.
3. SSL Offload:
   • Provides SSL termination at the edge, offloading the SSL decryption/encryption process from the backend servers.
4. Web Application Firewall (WAF):
   • Protects web applications from common threats and vulnerabilities like SQL injection, cross-site scripting (XSS), and more.
5. URL-based Routing:
   • Routes requests based on URL paths to different backend pools, enabling microservices architectures and path-based routing.
6. Custom Domains and Certificates:
   • Supports custom domains and provides SSL/TLS certificates for securing connections.
7. DDoS Protection:
   • Integrates with Azure DDoS Protection to mitigate distributed denial-of-service attacks.
8. Health Probes:
   • Monitors the health of backend services and directs traffic only to healthy endpoints.
9. Caching:
   • Caches static content at the edge to reduce latency and improve performance.

Use Cases for Azure Front Door

1. Global Web Applications:
   • Distribute web traffic across multiple regions to provide high availability and low latency for users worldwide.
   • Example: An e-commerce website serving customers globally can use Azure Front Door to ensure quick load times and high availability.
2. Performance Optimization:
   • Improve performance by caching static content at edge locations close to users.
   • Example: A media streaming service can use Azure Front Door to deliver video content quickly by caching it at edge locations.
3. Application Security:
   • Protect applications from web vulnerabilities and DDoS attacks using built-in WAF and DDoS protection.
   • Example: A financial services application can use Azure Front Door’s WAF to block malicious traffic and ensure secure transactions.
4. Microservices Architectures:
   • Route traffic based on URL paths to different backend services or microservices.
   • Example: A SaaS application can use URL-based routing to direct API requests to the appropriate microservice.
5. SSL Offloading:
   • Offload SSL termination to Azure Front Door to reduce the load on backend servers and simplify SSL certificate management.
   • Example: A healthcare application can use SSL offloading to ensure secure connections while reducing backend processing.
6. Disaster Recovery and Failover:
   • Automatically reroute traffic to healthy regions or backends in case of failures.
   • Example: An online gaming platform can use Azure Front Door to redirect traffic to a backup region if the primary region goes down.
7. Custom Domain and Certificate Management:
   • Use custom domains and manage SSL/TLS certificates for secure connections.
   • Example: A blogging platform can use custom domains with SSL certificates to provide a secure and branded experience for its users.
8. API Gateway:
   • Act as a global API gateway, providing a single entry point for APIs across multiple regions.
   • Example: A company providing a public API can use Azure Front Door to route requests to the nearest regional backend, ensuring low latency and high availability.