Simplify Virtual WAN Spoke Connectivity at Scale with Azure Virtual Network Manager
With Azure Virtual Network Manager (AVNM) integration, organizations using Virtual WAN for transitive connectivity can simplify spoke connectivity and policy management across large-scale hub-and-spoke deployments. By using a Virtual WAN hub as the hub in an AVNM hub-and-spoke topology, organizations can define connectivity and routing intent once at the network group level and apply it consistently across large numbers of spoke VNets. This reduces repetitive per-spoke connection and routing configuration, helps maintain operational consistency as deployments expand, and makes it easier to manage hub-and-spoke environments at scale. Together, AVNM’s centralized, group-based orchestration and Virtual WAN’s managed routing, security integration, and hybrid connectivity provide a more streamlined way to simplify operations and scale with confidence. What is Azure Virtual Network Manager? Azure Virtual Network Manager is a management service that lets you group, configure, and deploy network connectivity and security policies across virtual networks at scale. Instead of configuring VNet peering and access rules on each virtual network individually, you define network groups — logical collections of virtual networks based on static selection or dynamic Azure Policy conditions — and apply connectivity configurations and security admin rules to those groups. Key capabilities include: Hub-and-spoke and mesh topologies — Define how virtual networks in a network group connect to a central hub or to each other. Network groups — Group VNets statically or dynamically (using tags, subscriptions, resource group names, or other Azure Policy conditions). Security admin rules — Author and enforce access control lists across all VNets in a network group, providing a centralized layer of defense that complements NSGs and firewalls. Region-scoped deployment — Deploy configurations to specific Azure regions, enabling incremental rollout and controlled blast radius. AVNM operates as an overlay management layer — it orchestrates VNet peering, connectivity, and security rules without replacing the underlying networking primitives. What is Azure Virtual WAN? Azure Virtual WAN as a service brings together routing, security, VPN, ExpressRoute, and transitive connectivity in a hub-and-spoke architecture. A Virtual WAN hub is a managed regional resource that acts as a central transit point for branch connectivity, remote users, private enterprise connectivity, spoke virtual networks, and private traffic routing through security services. Site-to-site VPN connectivity (branch offices, SD-WAN devices) Point-to-site VPN connectivity (remote users) ExpressRoute private connectivity (on-premises datacenters) VNet-to-VNet transitive connectivity (spoke virtual networks) Routing, firewall, and encryption for private traffic All hubs in a Standard Virtual WAN are connected in a full mesh over the Microsoft backbone, enabling any-to-any connectivity between spokes, branches, and remote users across regions. Virtual WAN removes the need to manually manage complex route tables and transit VNets — routing is handled by the hub's built-in router. What this integration enables When you select a Virtual WAN hub as the hub in an AVNM connectivity configuration, AVNM handles the spoke-to-hub wiring for you. For each virtual network in your selected network groups: If the VNet is not yet connected to the Virtual WAN hub, AVNM creates the Virtual Network connection to Virtual WAN hub and applies a consistent routing configuration with Virtual WAN connection policy. If the VNet is already connected, AVNM updates the existing Virtual Network connection to utilize the routing properties in the Virtual WAN connection policy. A connection policy is a hub-level Virtual WAN resource that defines shared routing behavior for the virtual network connections it governs, including route table association and propagation, route maps, internet security settings, and propagated labels. Because the policy applies these settings consistently across governed connections, it helps standardize routing and overrides conflicting settings configured directly on individual connections. How it works The setup follows AVNM's standard workflow: Create a network group. Add virtual networks as members — either statically (by selecting specific VNets) or dynamically (using Azure Policy conditions such as tags or resource group names). Create a connectivity configuration. Choose hub-and-spoke topology, select your Virtual WAN hub as the hub, and select or create a connection policy. Deploy. Commit the configuration to your target regions. AVNM connects all VNets in the network groups to the Virtual WAN hub and applies the connection policy in parallel. You can also enable direct connectivity within a spoke network group. When enabled, VNet-to-VNet traffic within that group routes directly between virtual networks instead of transiting the Virtual WAN hub — useful for latency-sensitive or high-throughput east-west workloads. By default, direct connectivity is regional; enable global mesh to extend it across Azure regions. Key use cases Bulk spoke onboarding Connect many virtual networks to a Virtual WAN hub in one operation. All connections are orchestrated in parallel by AVNM, and the pre-defined routing configuration is automatically applied. Policy-based dynamic onboarding Use Azure Policy to define network group membership conditions. When a new virtual network matches those conditions—for example, a VNet tagged env:prod—it is automatically added to the network group. On the next deployment, AVNM connects it to the Virtual WAN hub with the correct routing configuration, reducing manual onboarding effort. Batch routing configuration updates Push routing changes to all virtual networks in a network group as a single, fully parallelized operation. This significantly reduces maintenance window duration for network-wide changes and makes rollback straightforward. Incremental deployment Segment your network into precise update domains by creating separate network groups — for example, by environment (staging, dev, production) or by region. Deploy connection policies to each group or region independently. This lets you test changes on a smaller subset before applying them broadly, minimizing blast radius. Mesh for selective inspection bypass If you use routing intent to send all private traffic through a firewall in the Virtual WAN hub, certain high-throughput or latency-sensitive flows (such as database replication) may benefit from bypassing that inspection. Enable direct connectivity in AVNM to create a mesh between selected spokes, allowing VNet-to-VNet traffic to route directly while all other traffic continues through the hub firewall. Security admin rules at scale Define network groups for your Virtual WAN spokes, then use AVNM security admin rules to author and deploy access control lists across those spokes. This provides an additional layer of defense alongside next-generation firewalls in the Virtual WAN hub. Getting started Prerequisites: An existing Azure Virtual Network Manager instance An existing Azure Virtual WAN and Virtual WAN hub One or more virtual networks to use as spoke members To configure: Go to your Network Manager instance in the Azure portal. Create a network group and add your spoke VNets. Create a connectivity configuration → select hub-and-spoke → select your Virtual WAN hub → select or create a connection policy → add spoke network groups. Deploy the configuration to your target regions. In your Virtual WAN resource, verify that the expected spoke VNet connections are in a connected state. Review effective routes in the virtual hub to confirm routing behavior matches the selected connection policy. For detailed step-by-step instructions, see Configure Azure Virtual WAN hub for Azure Virtual Network Manager. For more on connection policy, see Connection policy in Azure Virtual WAN. Learn more Azure Virtual Network Manager documentation Virtual WAN and Virtual Network Manager integration overview Azure Virtual WAN documentationSummarized Gateway Prefixes for Route Advertisement in Azure Virtual Networks
Background Many Azure deployments follow a hub-and-spoke topology: one VNet is designated as the hub and holds the connection to on-premises (via ExpressRoute Gateway, VPN Gateway, or both), and workload VNets — the spokes — peer to the hub to reach on-premises and shared services. This centralizes gateway connectivity so many workloads can share a single ExpressRoute or VPN Gateway. However, in large hub-and-spoke topologies, ExpressRoute and VPN Gateway limits on advertised prefixes (for example, 1,000 IPv4 and 100 IPv6 prefixes) can be reached. Because each spoke adds its own address prefixes to that count, these limits are approached quickly, constraining how far the topology can scale. What's New With Summarized Gateway Prefixes, customers can now advertise a single covering prefix (for example, 10.0.0.0/16) instead of many smaller CIDRs (for example, multiple /24s) – dramatically reducing advertised route count and enabling larger-scale Azure environments. A new property, summarizedGatewayPrefixes, is now available on the Virtual Network resource in public preview. When configured on a hub VNet, it controls what your ExpressRoute Gateway and VPN Gateway advertise to on-premises, replacing the default behavior of advertising all individual hub and spoke VNet CIDRs with a set of aggregated prefixes you define. For example, instead of advertising 10.0.1.0/24, 10.0.2.0/24, 10.0.3.0/24, and so on for each spoke, you can advertise a single 10.0.0.0/16. Key Benefits Fewer advertised routes — Replace hundreds of individual spoke CIDRs with a small set of summarized prefixes. Scales with your topology — Supports deployments with 500+ spokes without requiring address plan redesigns or VNet splits. IPv4 and IPv6 — Summarize both address families. Works with both gateway types — Supported on ExpressRoute Gateway and VPN Gateway. Simple configuration — A single property on the VNet resource. No additional services or dependencies. Backward compatible — If the property is left empty, behavior is unchanged: all hub and peered spoke address spaces are advertised as before. How It Works Default behavior ExpressRoute Gateway and VPN Gateway advertise all address spaces of the hub VNet and all address spaces of peered spoke VNets to on-premises. With summarizedGatewayPrefixes configured The gateways advertise the summarized prefixes instead of the hub VNet's individual address spaces. For each peered spoke, if the spoke's address space falls within a summarized prefix, the spoke's individual CIDRs are suppressed from advertisement. Spoke address spaces not covered by a summarized prefix continue to be advertised individually. Example: Without Summarization With Summarization 10.0.1.0/24, 10.0.2.0/24, 10.0.3.0/24, … 10.0.0.0/16 Hundreds of prefixes One prefix Getting Started Open the hub VNet (the VNet containing your GatewaySubnet) in the Azure portal. Go to Address space → Advertised gateway prefixes. Add one or more IPv4 or IPv6 CIDR prefixes that cover the address spaces you want to summarize. Navigate to your virtual network and verify that the summarized prefixes appear. Things to Know The property is set on the hub VNet (the VNet with the GatewaySubnet). The summarized prefixes list can include prefixes outside the VNet's own address space. Avoid overlap among prefixes within the list, but overlap with peered VNet address spaces is expected in hub-and-spoke designs. For dual-stack (IPv4 + IPv6) VNets, define both IPv4 and IPv6 summarized prefixes explicitly.
Azure virtual network terminal access point (TAP) public preview announcement
What is virtual network TAP? Virtual network TAP allows customers continuously stream virtual machine network traffic to a network packet collector or analytics tool. Many security and performance monitoring tools rely on packet-level insights that are difficult to access in cloud environments. Virtual network TAP bridges this gap by integrating with our industry partners to offer: Enhanced security and threat detection: Security teams can inspect full packet data in real-time to detect and respond to potential threats. Performance monitoring and troubleshooting: Operations teams can analyze live traffic patterns to identify bottlenecks, troubleshoot latency issues, and optimize application performance. Regulatory compliance: Organizations subject to compliance frameworks such as Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), and General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) can use virtual network TAP to capture network activity for auditing and forensic investigations. Why use virtual network TAP? Unlike traditional packet capture solutions that require deploying additional agents or network appliances, virtual network TAP leverages Azure's native infrastructure to enable seamless traffic mirroring without complex configurations and without impacting the performance of the virtual machine. A key advantage is that mirrored traffic does not count towards virtual machine’s network limits, ensuring complete visibility without compromising application performance. Additionally, virtual network TAP supports all Azure virtual machine SKU. Deploying virtual network TAP The portal is a convenient way to get started with Azure virtual network TAP. However, if you have a lot of Azure resources and want to automate the setup you may want to use a PowerShell, CLI, or REST API. Add a TAP configuration on a network interface that is attached to a virtual machine deployed in your virtual network. The destination is a virtual network IP address in the same virtual network as the monitored network interface or a peered virtual network. The collector solution for virtual network TAP can be deployed behind an Azure Internal Load balancer for high availability. You can use the same virtual network TAP resource to aggregate traffic from multiple network interfaces in the same or different subscriptions. If the monitored network interfaces are in different subscriptions, the subscriptions must be associated to the same Microsoft Entra tenant. Additionally, the monitored network interfaces and the destination endpoint for aggregating the TAP traffic can be in peered virtual networks in the same region. Partnering with industry leaders to enhance network monitoring in Azure To maximize the value of virtual network TAP, we are proud to collaborate with industry-leading security and network visibility partners. Our partners provide deep packet inspection, analytics, threat detection, and monitoring solutions that seamlessly integrate with virtual network TAP: Network packet brokers Partner Product Gigamon GigaVUE Cloud Suite for Azure Keysight CloudLens Security analytics, network/application performance management Partner Product Darktrace Darktrace /NETWORK Netscout Omnis Cyber Intelligence NDR Corelight Corelight Open NDR Platform LinkShadow LinkShadow NDR Fortinet FortiNDR Cloud FortiGate VM cPacket cPacket Cloud Suite TrendMicro Trend Vision One™ Network Security Extrahop RevealX Bitdefender GravityZone Extended Detection and Response for Network eSentire eSentire MDR Vectra Vectra NDR AttackFence AttackFence NDR Arista Networks Arista NDR See our partner blogs: Bitdefender + Microsoft Virtual Network TAP: Deepening Visibility, Strengthening Security Streamline Traffic Mirroring in the Cloud with Azure Virtual Network Terminal Access Point (TAP) and Keysight Visibility | Keysight Blogs eSentire | Unlocking New Possibilities for Network Monitoring and… LinkShadow Unified Identity, Data, and Network Platform Integrated with Microsoft Virtual Network TAP Extrahop and Microsoft Extend Coverage for Azure Workloads Resources | Announcing cPacket Partnership with Azure virtual network terminal access point (TAP) Gain Network Traffic Visibility with FortiGate and Azure virtual network TAP Get started with virtual network TAP To learn more and get started, visit our website. We look forward to seeing how you leverage virtual network TAP to enhance security, performance, and compliance in your cloud environment. Stay tuned for more updates as we continue to refine and expand on our feature set! If you have any questions please reach out to us at azurevnettap@microsoft.com.
Consistent DNS resolution in a hybrid hub spoke network topology
DNS is one of the most essential networking services, next to IP routing. A modern hybrid cloud network may have various sources of DNS: Azure Private DNS Zones, public DNS, domain controllers, etc. Some organizations may also prefer to route their public Internet DNS queries through a specific DNS provider. Therefore, it is crucial to ensure consistent DNS resolution across the whole (hybrid) network. This article describes how DNS Private Resolver can be leveraged to build such architecture.
Private subnets by default in Azure Virtual Networks: What changed and how to use NAT Gateway
Azure is evolving to better support secure‑by‑default cloud architectures. Starting with API version 2025‑07‑01 (released after March 31, 2026), newly created virtual networks now default to using private subnets. This change removes the long‑standing platform behavior of automatically enabling outbound internet access through implicit public IPs, also known as default outbound access (DOA). As a result: newly deployed virtual machines will not have public outbound connectivity unless explicitly configured. What changed? Previously, Azure automatically assigned a hidden Microsoft‑owned public IP to virtual machines deployed without an explicit outbound method (such as NAT Gateway, Load Balancer outbound rules, or instance‑level public IPs). This allowed public outbound connectivity without requiring customer configuration. While convenient, this model introduced challenges: Security – Implicit internet access conflicts with Zero Trust principles. Reliability – Platform‑managed outbound IPs can change unexpectedly. Operational consistency – VMSS instances or multi‑NIC VMs may egress using different default outbound IPs. With API version 2025‑07‑01 and later: Subnets in newly created VNets are private by default. The subnet property `defaultOutboundAccess` is set to false. Azure no longer assigns implicit outbound public IPs. This applies across deployment methods including Portal, ARM/Bicep, CLI, and PowerShell. Portal has started using the new model as of April 1, 2026. Note: This change has not yet applied to Terraform. Am I impacted by this change? Deployment scenario Behavior Existing VNets or VMs using DOA ✅ Unchanged New VMs in existing VNets ✅ Unchanged Subnets already using explicit outbound ✅ Continue using configured outbound method New VMs in new VNets (with subnets created using API 07-01-2025 or later) 🔒 Subnets private by default New VMs in private subnets without explicit outbound configured ❌ No public outbound connectivity Existing workloads are not impacted. If required, you can still create new subnets without the private setting by choosing the appropriate configuration option during creation. See the FAQ section of this blog for more information. However, we strongly recommend transitioning to an explicit outbound method so that: Your workloads won’t be affected by public IP address changes. You have greater control over how your VMs connect to public endpoints. Your VMs use traceable IP resources that you own. When is outbound connectivity required? If your virtual network contains virtual machines, you must configure explicit outbound connectivity. Here are common scenarios that require it: Virtual machine operating system activation and updates, such as Windows or Linux. Pulling container images from public registries (Docker Hub or Microsoft Container Registry). Accessing 3rd party SaaS or public APIs Virtual machine scale sets using flexible orchestration mode are always secure by default and therefore require an explicit outbound method. Private subnets don’t apply to delegated or managed subnets that host PaaS services. In these cases, the service handles outbound connectivity—see the service-specific documentation for details. Recommended outbound connectivity method: StandardV2 NAT Gateway Azure now recommends using an explicit outbound connectivity method such as: NAT Gateway Load Balancer outbound rules Public IP assigned to the VM Network Virtual Appliance (NVA) / Firewall Among these, Azure StandardV2 NAT Gateway is the recommended method for outbound connectivity for scalable and resilient outbound connectivity. StandardV2 NAT Gateway: Provides zone‑redundancy by default in supported regions Supports up to 100 Gbps throughput Provides dual-stack support with IPv4 and IPv6 public IPs Uses customer‑owned static public IPs Enables outbound connectivity without allowing inbound internet access Requires no route table configuration when associated to a subnet When configured, NAT Gateway automatically becomes the subnet’s default outbound path and takes precedence over: Load Balancer outbound rules VM instance‑level public IPs Note: UDRs for 0.0.0.0/0 traffic directed to virtual appliances/Firewall takes precedence over NAT gateway. Migrate from Default Outbound Access to NAT Gateway To transition from DOA to Azure’s recommended method of outbound, StandardV2 NAT Gateway: Go to your virtual network in the portal, and select the subnet you want to modify. In the Edit subnet menu, select the ‘Enable private subnet’ checkbox under the Private subnet section Enabling private subnet can also be done through other supported clients, below is an example for CLI, in which the default-outbound parameter is set to false: az network vnet subnet update \ --resource-group rgname \ --name subnetname \ --vnet-name vnetname \ --default-outbound false 3. Deploy a StandardV2 NAT gateway resource. 4. Associate one or more StandardV2 public IP addresses or prefixes. 5. Attach the NAT gateway to the target subnet. Once associated: All new outbound traffic from that subnet uses NAT Gateway automatically VM‑level public IPs are no longer required Existing outbound connections are not interrupted Note: Enabling private subnet on an existing subnet will not affect any VMs already using default outbound IPs. Private subnet ensures that only new VMs don’t receive a default outbound public IP. For step-by-step guidance, see migrate default outbound access to NAT Gateway. FAQ 1. Will my existing workloads lose outbound connectivity? No. Workloads currently using default outbound IPs are not impacted by this change. The private subnet by default update only affects: Newly created VNets New subnets created using the updated API, 2025-07-01 New virtual machines deployed into those subnets using the updated API VMs and subnets using an explicit outbound connectivity method like a NAT gateway, NVA / Firewall, a VM instance level public IP or Load balancer outbound rules is not impacted by this change. 2. Why can’t my new VM reach the internet or other public endpoints within Microsoft (e.g. VM activation, updates)? New subnets are private by default. If your deployment does not include an explicit outbound method — such as a NAT Gateway, Public IP, Load Balancer outbound rule, or NVA/Firewall— outbound connectivity is not automatically enabled. 3. My workload has a dependency on default outbound IPs and isn’t ready to move to private subnets, what should I do? You can opt-out of the default private subnet setting by disabling the private subnet feature. You can do this in the portal by unselecting the private subnet checkbox: Disabling private subnet can also be done through other supported clients, below is an example for CLI, in which the default-outbound parameter is set to true: az network vnet subnet update \ --resource-group rgname \ --name subnetname \ --vnet-name vnetname \ --default-outbound true 4. Why do I see an alert showing that I have a default outbound IP on my VM? There's a NIC-level parameter `defaultOutboundConnectivityEnabled` that tracks whether a default outbound IP is allocated to a VM/Virtual Machine Scale Set instance. If detected, the Azure portal displays a notification banner and will generate Azure Advisor recommendations about disabling default outbound connectivity for your VMs / VMSS. 5. How do I clear this alert? To remove the default outbound IP and clear the alert: Configure a StandardV2 NAT gateway (or other explicit outbound method). Set your subnet to be private or by setting the subnet property defaultOutboundAccess = false using one of the supported clients. Stop and deallocate any applicable virtual machines (this will remove the default outbound IP currently associated with the VM). 6. I have a NAT gateway (or UDR pointing to an NVA) configured for my private subnet, why do I still see this alert? In some cases, a default outbound IP is still assigned to virtual machines in a non-private subnet, even when an explicit outbound method—such as a NAT gateway or a UDR directing traffic to an NVA/firewall—is configured. This does not mean that the default outbound IP is used for egress traffic. To fully remove the assignment (and clear the alert): Set the subnet to private Stop and deallocate the affected virtual machines Summary The move to private subnets by default improves the security posture of Azure networking deployments by removing implicit outbound internet access. Customers deploying new workloads must now explicitly configure outbound connectivity. StandardV2 NAT Gateway provides a scalable, resilient method for enabling outbound internet access without exposing workloads to inbound connections or relying on platform‑managed IPs. Learn more Default Outbound Access StandardV2 NAT Gateway Migrate Default Outbound Access to StandardV2 NAT Gateway
Azure VNet Data Gateway for Secure Power BI & Power Platform Access in Enterprises
What Is a VNet data gateway? The VNet data gateway is a Microsoft‑managed gateway service that runs inside a delegated subnet of an Azure Virtual Network. It allows supported Microsoft cloud services—such as Power BI, Power Platform dataflows, and Microsoft Fabric workloads—to securely connect to data sources that are protected using private networking. Key characteristics: No customer‑managed VM or container No OS, patching, or gateway software upgrades Gateway lifecycle fully managed by Microsoft Traffic stays on the Azure backbone network Works seamlessly with Private Endpoints This makes it ideal for enterprise and regulated environments where security and operational efficiency are equally important. Why Enterprises need VNet data gateway Eliminates gateway infrastructure management Traditional gateways require: Virtual machines High availability setup OS patching and scaling Monitoring and troubleshooting With the VNet data gateway: Microsoft manages compute lifecycle No VM or gateway software to maintain No HA or load balancer design needed ✅ Result: Significant reduction in operational and maintenance overhead for platform and infrastructure teams. Secure access to private Azure resources Most enterprise Azure environments use: Private Endpoints NSGs and route tables Firewalls blocking public access The VNet data gateway: Is injected into a delegated subnet in your VNet Uses private IP addressing Enforces NSG and UDR rules Communicates with Microsoft services over a Microsoft‑managed internal tunnel ✅ Result: Data sources remain fully private—no public endpoints or inbound ports required. Designed for Power Platform & Power BI at Scale The gateway supports secure access for: Power BI semantic models Power BI paginated reports Microsoft Fabric Dataflow Gen2 Fabric pipelines and copy jobs Because it’s cloud‑native and centrally managed, the VNet data gateway scales well in large enterprises standardizing on Power Platform and Fabric. High‑level architecture overview At runtime, the VNet data gateway works as follows: A query is initiated from Power BI / Power Platform Query details and credentials are sent to the Microsoft Power Platform VNet service A containerized gateway instance is injected into the delegated subnet The gateway connects to the private data source using private networking Results are sent back to Power BI or Power Platform via a Microsoft‑managed internal tunnel Key security highlights: No inbound connectivity No public IP exposure Traffic remains on Azure backbone Full enforcement of NSGs and routing rules Key Enterprise benefits Least management overhead – no gateway servers Zero Trust aligned – private-only connectivity Fully managed by Microsoft Enterprise-grade security & governance Works with Azure Private Endpoint architectures When to Use VNet Data Gateway Scenario Recommendation Azure private PaaS services ✅ VNet data gateway Private Endpoint–only access ✅ VNet data gateway Zero Trust network model ✅ VNet data gateway Minimal ops & maintenance ✅ VNet data gateway On‑prem only, no Azure ❌ Traditional gateway Step‑by‑step configuration: VNet data gateway (Enterprise setup) High‑level flow (What you will configure) Register required Azure resource provider Prepare Azure Virtual Network and subnet Configure private connectivity to data source Create the VNet data gateway Create and bind data source connections Validate with Power BI / Power Platform workloads Step 1: Register Microsoft.PowerPlatform resource provider Why this step is required The VNet data gateway is a Microsoft‑managed service that is injected into your Azure VNet. Azure must explicitly allow Power Platform to deploy managed infrastructure into your subscription. Configuration steps Sign in to Azure portal Navigate to Subscriptions Select the subscription that hosts the target VNet Go to Resource providers Search for Microsoft.PowerPlatform Click Register ✅ Status must show Registered This step enables subnet delegation to Power Platform services. Step 2: Prepare the Azure Virtual Network Why this step is required The gateway runs inside your VNet. It must be placed in a dedicated, delegated subnet to maintain isolation and security boundaries. Requirements VNet can be in any Azure region Subnet must be exclusive to VNet data gateway Subnet must have outbound connectivity to the data source Configuration steps Go to Azure portal → virtual networks Select your existing VNet (or create one) Navigate to Subnets → + Subnet Configure: Subnet name: snet-vnet-datagateway Address range: /27 or larger (recommended) Subnet delegation: Microsoft.PowerPlatform/vnetaccesslinks Save the subnet ⚠️ Do not place any VMs, app gateway, or other workloads in this subnet. Step 3: Configure private connectivity to the data source Why this step is required Enterprises typically block public access to PaaS services. The VNet data gateway is designed to work natively with private endpoints. Example: Azure SQL / SQL Managed Instance Create Private Endpoint for the data service Attach it to the same VNet (can be different subnet) Create or link a Private DNS Zone, for example: privatelink.database.windows.net Link the Private DNS Zone to the VNet Ensure DNS resolution from the delegated subnet resolves to private IP ✅ This ensures all traffic remains private and internal. Step 4: Create the VNet data gateway Why this step is required This is where the actual Microsoft‑managed gateway is logically created and associated with your VNet. Configuration steps You can do this from either Power BI Service or Power Platform Admin Center. Using Power Platform Admin Center Go to https://admin.powerplatform.microsoft.com Select Data → Gateways Click + New → Virtual network data gateway Provide: Gateway name Azure subscription Resource group Virtual network Delegated subnet Click Create 📌 Notes: Gateway metadata is stored in Power BI tenant home region Gateway runtime executes in the VNet region No VM or scale settings are required Step 5: Create and configure data source connections Why this step is required The gateway exists, but Power BI / Power Platform must know which data sources can be accessed via it. Configuration steps (Power BI example) Go to Power BI Service Navigate to Settings → Manage connections and gateways Select the newly created VNet data gateway Click + New connection Provide: Data source type (Azure SQL, Storage, Databricks, etc.) Server / endpoint name (private DNS name) Authentication (SQL / Entra ID) Save the connection Assign users or security groups ✅ This step enables governance and access control. Step 6: Use the gateway in Power BI / Power Platform Power BI Open dataset or semantic model settings Under Gateway connection, select: Use a data gateway Choose the VNet data gateway Apply changes Refresh or run queries Power Platform / Fabric Select the same connection when configuring: Dataflows Gen2 Fabric pipelines Copy jobs Step 7: Validate and test Validation Checklist ✅ DNS resolves to private IP ✅ No public endpoint access enabled ✅ NSGs allow outbound traffic to data source ✅ Dataset refresh succeeds ✅ No gateway VM exists in subscription Optional: Enable logging and auditing from Power BI / Fabric Monitor gateway health in Admin Center Key Enterprise design guidance (Best practices) Use one gateway per environment tier (Prod / Non‑Prod) Use dedicated VNets for data access where possible Use Private Endpoint only (avoid service endpoints) Control access via AAD groups, not individuals Avoid mixing gateway subnet with other workloads Conclusion: For enterprises looking to consume Power Platform, Power BI, and Microsoft Fabric securely while keeping operational overhead close to zero, the VNet data gateway is the recommended approach. It removes gateway infrastructure complexity, strengthens security posture, and aligns perfectly with modern Azure landing zone and Zero Trust architectures.
A demonstration of Virtual Network TAP
Azure Virtual Network Terminal Access Point (VTAP), at the time of writing in April 2026 in public preview in select regions, copies network traffic from source Virtual Machines to a collector or traffic analytics tool, running as a Network Virtual Appliance (NVA). VTAP creates a full copy of all traffic sent and received by Virtual Machine Network Interface Card(s) (NICs) designated as VTAP source(s). This includes packet payload content - in contrast to VNET Flow Logs, which only collect traffic meta data. Traffic collectors and analytics tools are 3rd party partner products, available from the Azure Marketplace, amongst which are the major Network Detection and Response solutions. VTAP is an agentless, cloud-native traffic tap at the Azure network infrastructure level. It is entirely out-of-band; it has no impact on the source VM's network performance and the source VM is unaware of the tap. Tapped traffic is VXLAN-encapsulated and delivered to the collector NVA, in the same VNET as the source VMs, or in a peered VNET. This post demonstrates the basic functionality of VTAP: copying traffic into and out of a source VM, to a destination VM. The demo consists of 3 three Windows VMs in one VNET, each running a basic web server that responds with the VM's name. Another VNET contains the target - a Windows VM on which Wireshark is installed, to inspect traffic forwarded by VTAP. This demo does not use 3rd party VTAP partner solutions from the Marketplace. The lab for this demonstration is available on Github: Virtual Network TAP. The VTAP resource is configured with the target VM's NIC as the destination. All traffic captured from sources is VXLAN-encapsulated and sent to the destination on UDP port 4789 (this cannot be changed). We use a single source to easier inspect the traffic flows in Wireshark; we will see that communication from the other VMs to our source VM is captured and copied to the destination. In a real world scenario, multiple or all of the VMs in an environment could be set up as TAP sources. The source VM, vm1, generates traffic through a script that continuously polls vm2 and vm3 on http://10.0.2.5 and http://10.0.2.6, and https://ipconfig.io. On the destination VM, we use Wireshark to observe captured traffic. The filter on UDP port 4789 causes Wireshark to only capture the VXLAN encapsulated traffic forwarded by VTAP. Wireshark automatically decodes VXLAN and displays the actual traffic to and from vm1, which is set up as the (only) VTAP source. Wireshark's capture panel shows the decapsulated TCP and HTTP exchanges, including the TCP handshake, between vm1 and the other VMs, and https://ipconfig.io. Expanding the lines in the detail panel below the capture panel shows the details of the VXLAN encapsulation. The outer IP packets, encapsulating the VXLAN frames in UDP, originate from the source VM's IP address, 10.0.2.4, and have the target VM's address, 10.1.1.4, as the destination. The VXLAN frames contain all the details of the original Ethernet frames sent from and received by the source VM, and the IP packets within those. The Wireshark trace shows the full exchange between vm1 and the destinations it speaks with. This brief demonstration uses Wireshark to simply visualize the operation of VTAP. The partner solutions available from the Azure Marketplace operate on the captured traffic to implement their specific functionality.Custom DHCP support in Azure
Discover the intricacies of Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP), a network protocol used for assigning IP addresses and network parameters. Learn about the DORA process, lease renewals, and the role of DHCP Relay in large enterprises. Gain insight into how DHCP operates in Azure natively and how its support in Azure has evolved over time, including the removal of rate-limiting for relayed traffic. This comprehensive guide also covers the limitations and potential workarounds of DHCP in Azure. Ideal for network administrators and IT professionals.Network Detection and Response (NDR) in Financial Services
New PCI DSS v4.0.1 requirements heighten the need for automated monitoring and analysis of security logs. Network Detection and Response solutions fulfill these mandates by providing 24/7 network traffic inspection and real-time alerting on suspicious activities. Azure’s native tools (Azure vTAP for full packets, VNET Flow Logs for all flows) capture rich network data and integrate with advanced NDR analytics from partners. This combination detects intrusions (satisfying IDS requirements under Requirement 11), validates network segmentation (for scope reduction under Req. 1), and feeds alerts into Microsoft Sentinel for rapid response (fulfilling incident response obligations in Req. 12). The result is a cloud architecture that not only meets PCI DSS controls but actively strengthens security.
Announcing Azure DNS security policy with Threat Intelligence feed general availability
Azure DNS security policy with Threat Intelligence feed allows early detection and prevention of security incidents on customer Virtual Networks where known malicious domains sourced by Microsoft’s Security Response Center (MSRC) can be blocked from name resolution. Azure DNS security policy with Threat Intelligence feed is being announced to all customers and will have regional availability in all public regions.
