Release Notes : F5 SSL Orchestrator Release Notes version 15.0.0-6.2

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F5 SSL Orchestrator

  • 15.0.0
Release Notes
Original Publication Date: 07/17/2019 Updated Date: 11/03/2021

Summary:

This release note documents the version 6.2 release of F5 SSL Orchestrator.

Contents:

Platform support

SSL Orchestrator standalone base license is supported on the following platforms:

Platform name Platform ID
i2800 C120
i5800 C121
i10800 C122
i11800 Discovery Extreme C123
i15800 Endeavour D116
High Performance F5 SSL Orchestrator Virtual Edition (VE) options:
  • 8 CPU
  • 16 CPU
  • 16 GB RAM or greater
Z100
Note: SSL Orchestrator 6.2 does not work with BIG-IP versions prior to 15.0.0. Refer to the Installing and Upgrading SSL Orchestrator section for complete installation and upgrade information.
Note: You must always set a large management provisioning.
Note: The supported platform information applies to the most recent release version.

If SSL Orchestrator is the standalone base license installed on your system, you can add the following modules:

  • URLF Filtering (subscription)
  • IPI (subscription)
  • Network HSM
  • Access Policy Manager (APM)
Note: For more information about purchasing other module licenses, contact your F5 Sales representative.

F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) base license with SSL Orchestrator as an add-on is supported on any available iSeries, Bourne, and VIPRION platforms:

Platform name
2000, i2000
4000, i4000
5000, i5000
7000, i7000
10000, i10000
11000, i11000
12000 (Bourne)
i15000
Chassis: VPR-24XX, VPR-4800
Note: SSL Orchestrator 6.2 does not work with BIG-IP versions prior to 15.0.0. Refer to the Installing and Upgrading SSL Orchestrator section for complete installation and upgrade information.
Note: The supported platform information applies to the most recent release version.

Guided Configuration browser support

The Guided Configuration acts as the template for SSL Orchestrator. This release supports the following browsers and versions for use with Guided Configuration for SSL Orchestrator:

  • Microsoft Internet Explorer 11.x - Only 32-bit browsers are supported.
  • Mozilla Firefox 55.x
  • Google Chrome 61.x

User documentation for this release

For a comprehensive list of documentation that is relevant to this release, refer to the SSL Orchestrator Documentation page.

Features in SSL Orchestrator

F5 recommends you review the entire SSL Orchestrator release notes and setup guide prior to upgrading and configuring a deployment.

Note: The SSL Orchestrator upgrade workflow has changed. Reviewing the release note section on Installing and Upgrading SSL Orchestrator provides you with the details necessary for fulling any prerequisites and required steps that streamline the process.

Guided Configuration for SSL Orchestrator

Guided configuration is meant to guide you through setting up a particular use case on the SSL Orchestrator system. Each template requests minimal input and provides contextual help to assist users during setup. The current version of the Guided Configuration is displayed on the landing page. When a later upgrade becomes available, you can use the available link next to the version number to download it from downloads.f5.com then upload and install Guided Configuration for SSL Orchestrator on BIG-IP. Prior to installing and upgrading to the latest version of SSL Orchestrator, ensure that you read the release notes and setup guide for any prerequisites, task details, or troubleshooting and recovery steps during installation or upgrade.

Guided Configuration for SSL Orchestrator TLS 1.3 support

TLS 1.3 support is provided in Guided Configuration for SSL Orchestrator for inbound cases, both clientssl and serverssl, for enhanced performance and security.

SSL Orchestrator Topologies

SSL Orchestrator configuration topologies define the type of traffic (transparent or explicit) and the direction of traffic flow (inbound or outbound) you wish to inspect. These deployment settings, which can be modified as needed without undeploying a configuration, are complimented by SSL management settings that assist you in defining inbound decryption and outbound decryption, setting your service types (such as HTTP, ICAP, Layer 2/Layer 3 inline, and receive-only/TAP services) and creating your service policies by defining per-request and per-session policy settings that can be managed through a virtual policy editor.

  • Outbound transparent proxy
  • Outbound explicit proxy
  • Inbound reverse proxy
  • Outbound layer 2
  • Inbound layer 2

The Existing Application topology is an inbound topology that allows you to create services, service chains, and security policies and attach them to an existing reverse proxy BIG-IP application.

Licensing and Provisioning for SSL Orchestrator Access Integration

Updated SSL Orchestrator Setup Utility with resource provisioning capabilities for licensed and unlicensed modules.

Multi-Layered Security

In order to solve specific security challenges, security administrators are accustomed to manually chaining together multiple point products, creating a bare-bones “security chain” consisting of multiple services. A typical chain may include components like Data Leak Prevention (DLP) scanners, Web Application Firewalls (WAF), Intrusion Prevention and Detection Systems (IPS and IDS), Malware Analysis tools, Secure Web Gateways (SWG), and more. In this model, all user sessions are provided the same level of security, as this “daisy chain” of services is hard-wired.

Virtual Clustered Multiprocessing (vCMP)

SSL Orchestrator supports Virtual Clustered Multiprocessing (vCMP) to provision and manage multiple hosted instances of the BIG-IP software on a single hardware platform.

Classification Engine

Classification Engine provides a rich set of methods based on context to dynamically determine how best to optimize the flow through the security stack. Context can minimally come from the following:

  • Source IP/subnet
  • Destination IP/subnet
  • IP intelligence category - Subscription
  • IP geolocation
  • Host and domain name
  • URL filtering category - Subscription
  • Destination port
  • Protocol

Other classifiers with greater flexibility are also available in the SSL Orchestrator VPE and with iRules to optimize and evaluate additional information.

Deployment Modes

SSL Orchestrator provides multiple deployment modes to address a variety of user needs. It can be deployed in any of the following modes:
  • Single device mode
  • High availability (HA) cluster mode

In addition, the system can detect and transparently handle an explicit proxy between SSL Orchestrator and the internet.

SSL Orchestrator Analytics

SSL Orchestrator analytics provide a customizable view into your SSL Orchestrator statistics, and enable you to flexibly choose the information you want to view based on specified ranges of time that you can select and adjust.

Statistics generated:

  • Hit Count
  • Client Bytes Out Per Second
  • Duration
  • Server Bytes In
  • Server Bytes In Per Second
  • Hit Count Per Second
  • Server Bytes Out Per Second
  • Client Bytes In
  • Client Bytes In Per Second
  • Client Bytes Out
  • Server Bytes Out

Statistics are generated for the following dimensions:

  • Client Cipher Names
  • Client Cipher Versions
  • Server Cipher Names
  • Server Cipher Versions
  • Virtual Servers
  • Site IP Addresses
  • Traffic Types
  • Decryption Status
  • Policy Actions
  • Service Paths
  • URL Categories
  • Applications
  • Application Families
  • IP Reputation
  • Destination Countries

L7 Application Protocol Settings

SSL Orchestrator supports L7 application protocol settings allowing you to select a protocol to listen for specific traffic (IMAP, SMTPS, POP3, FTP, HTTP) to be processed.

Fixes

ID number Description
749749 The UI does not show Network Settings in the Service form after adding L3 details with the Create New option and saving the information. Workaround: Delete the service and start the configuration again. Fix: After saving the Service details, the UI now shows Network Settings.
754939 The SSL Orchestrator Security Policy builder supports only the good/bad option for IP Reputation while previous 3.x versions supports specific IP Intelligence Category groups. As a result, the user cannot restore the exact 3.x policy within the SSL Orchestrator Guide Configuration. Workaround: Disable the strictness of the security policy and manually select the categories in the VPE. Fix: A category option was added to the security policy IP reputation condition to allow users to select a specific IP Intelligence category to take action.
756416 SSL Orchestrator Interception Rule re-deployment fails with an error message indicating sslo_ob_INTERCEPTION_RULE_MODIFY_sslo_ap-in-t-4 Error: shared/iapp/blocks/. In result, the configuration cannot be deployed. Workaround: Delete the configuration and create the deployment again. Fix: Guided Configuration for SSL Orchestrator background cleanup process that caused the deletion has been fixed.
759595 The command history file (/root/.tmsh-history-root) does not open and permission is denied after deployment or re-deployment. Fix: This message will no longer be visible in the log file.
761124 When using Firefox, adding a Security Policy Rule fails for Client IP Subnet Match and Client Port Match options. Fix: SSL Orchestrator updates ensure Firefox works based on the same conditions.
761343 In the Security Policy configuration screen, after you switch from an existing policy to a new policy, or from a new policy to an existing policy, an "Unsaved Changes" warning message appears. Fix: The "Unsaved Changes" warning message now properly displays only when changes are made.
776169 The SSL Forward Proxy Action gets reset when moving rules during a policy creation causing the SSL Forward Proxy Action value of the newly added rule to change to Bypass. Fix: The SSL Forward Proxy Action rule is no longer changed to Bypass and now remains the same (as intended).
787449 A warning message is displayed after deploying an Existing topology. Workaround: Delete the topology after deploying the Existing topology configuration. Refresh the page and the warning message is removed. Fix: Deployment for an Existing topology is fixed and the warming message is no longer displayed.
787797 The iRule uses the wrong method for category lookup when URLDB/SWG is not provisioned. Currently, the iRule in the topology uses the wrong method to fetch category lookup for HTTP traffic. This results in the traffic to be reset. Workaround: Manually change the lookup type in the iRule. Fix: The lookup type in the iRule, based on URLDB and SWG provisioning status, is fixed.
788481 When the load balancing method is Ratio and the "Port remap" feature is enabled, SSL Orchestrator does not load balance between the inline service pool members. Fix: The inline service pool naming is fixed and traffic is passing through both services when the port remap is enabled.

Install and upgrade SSL Orchestrator

If you currently have a version of SSL Orchestrator prior to 5.0, or are installing SSL Orchestrator for the first time, refer to the complete installation and upgrade instructions for F5 SSL Orchestrator in the SSL Orchestrator: Setup version 15.0.0-6.0 guide.

If you currently have SSL Orchestrator 5.x or 6.x version installed, click SSL Orchestration > Configuration > Upgrade SSL Orchestrator and follow the SSL Orchestrator RPM upgrade instructions to import the newest 6.2 version.

To install the F5 SSL Orchestrator 6.2 and you do not have an existing SSL Orchestrator add-on license, or a previous version of SSL Orchestrator installed, download the image from downloads.f5.com. For complete step-by-step installation instructions, see the BIG-IP Systems: Upgrading Software guide. The Guided Configuration for SSL Orchestrator 6.0 image is packaged with the F5 BIG-IP 15.0.0 image.

To upgrade to the newest version of SSL Orchestrator from a previous version prior to 5.0, or you have an existing add-on license, follow the recommended upgrade steps found in the SSL Orchestrator recommended upgrade procedure section in the SSL Orchestrator: Setup guide. This procedure walks you through the uninstallation and deletion of existing SSL Orchestrator applications and RPM before installing the new ISO image.

If you do not follow the recommended upgrade procedure to undeploy your previous SSL Orchestrator deployments, as well as uninstall your previous version of the application, further manual steps are required to reset your environment and undeploy the previous version. See the Upgrade from previous SSL Orchestrator versions using the recovery procedure task steps in the SSL Orchestrator: Setup guide based on the previous version of SSL Orchestrator you are upgrading from and your access to the BIG-IP Applications LX menu.

These upgrade steps are required since previously deployed SSL Orchestrator configurations cannot be rolled forward or imported into the new version of SSL Orchestrator. Following one of the recommended upgrade procedures will assist you in preparing your system for a clean installation.

Note: If you are implementing a high availability environment for SSL Orchestrator, review the Setting up SSL Orchestrator in a High Availability Environment section in the SSL Orchestrator: Setup guide for more detailed information.

Contacting F5

North America 1-888-882-7535 or (206) 272-6500
Outside North America, Universal Toll-Free +800 11 ASK 4 F5 or (800 11275 435)
Additional phone numbers Regional Offices
Web http://www.f5.com
Email support@f5.com

Additional resources

You can find additional support resources and technical documentation through a variety of sources.

F5 Support

https://f5.com/support :: Self-solve Options

Free self-service tools give you 24x7 access to a wealth of knowledge and technical support. Whether it is providing quick answers to questions, training your staff, or handling entire implementations from design to deployment, F5 services teams are ready to ensure that you get the most from your F5 technology.

AskF5 Knowledge Base

https://support.f5.com/csp/home

The storehouse for thousands of knowledgebase articles that help you manage your F5 products more effectively. Whether you want to browse periodically to research a solution, or you need the most recent news about your F5 products, AskF5 is your source.

BIG-IP iHealth Diagnostics and BIG-IP iHealth Viewer

https://f5.com/support/tools/ihealth

BIG-IP iHealth Diagnostics identifies issues, including common configuration problems and known software issues. It also provides solutions and links to more information. With BIG-IP iHealth Viewer, you can see the status of your system at-a-glance, drill down for details, and view your network configuration.

F5 DevCentral

https://devcentral.f5.com/

Collaborate and share innovations including code samples, new techniques, and other tips, with more than 300,000 F5 users worldwide. DevCentral is the place to ask questions, find solutions, learn to harness the power of F5’s powerful scripting language, iRules, and much more.

Communications Preference Center

https://interact.f5.com/F5-Preference-Center.html

Here, you can subscribe to a number of communications from F5. For information about the types of notifications F5 provides, see K9970: Subscribing to email notifications regarding F5 products.