What is Azure Jumpbox?

1. Pre-requisite Knowledge –

Before we start with the understanding of what is Azure Jumpbox, we should know –

1. Basic knowledge of cloud computing and its services
2. Basic knowledge of Microsoft Azure
3. Basic knowledge of Virtual machine and networking

2. What is Jumpbox and what it does? –

• When we create a virtual machine in Azure cloud.
• This virtual machine is on the virtual network on the Azure cloud.
• We can connect to this virtual machine using PowerShell or remote desktop connection (RDP).
• When we connect to the Azure virtual machine then it connects your on-premise network to Azure virtual network using the site-to-site virtual network or express route.
• We connect to the dynamic IP address of the Azure virtual machine.
• If we do not have connectivity to the virtual network from the on-premise network, then we need to create endpoints/NAT rules to VM to get connectivity from the internet. However, this will expose a lot of VM’s directly to the VM.
• In this situation, the Azure Jumpbox helps us. By this approach, we will enable only one VM in Azure to enable connectivity over the internet. This VM is called as Jumpbox also named as Jump server.
• Then, by using this VM, we can connect to the other Azure VM’s using dynamic IP.
• Jump box prevents all Azure VM’s to expose to the public.
• Jump box can be set-up easily using ARM
• We can do monitoring and logging on a single box.
• We can easily turn the ON/OFF remote desktop connectivity feature.
• By using the network security group, we can restrict the IP addresses to communicate with the Jump box.
• We can block the public IP address associated with the VM. It helps to improve security.

Conclusion - In this article, we have learned the overview of Azure Jumpbox.