Connecting internal network to public server

Question

I want to implement the following scenario. I have an application that is hosted on a public server. My requirement is that I want make the internal network visible to the application. E.g http://app.com is the web app. One PC 172.16.1.54 has internet connection. I want my application to scan other hosts on network 172.16.1.0/24 using 172.16.1.54 (Not all PCs will have internet connection)

I did some research and some people suggested to configure a site-to-site vpn. However I am unable to grasp the concept.

Can some one please explain how this scenario will be implemented?

Answer 1

There are 2 approaches for VPN, one is site-to-site VPN and other is VPN client access. I think VPN client access is sufficient(If the hosted app server is the only server wants to access 172.16.1.0/24)

You should configure you hosted app server(as VPN client) to create tunnel to your site. I believe your site has the gateway(Router), make VPN config according to that. Now in your app you should explicit scan 172.16.1.0/24 network. Once that hosted app server has the VPN configuration, then it knows how to forward the traffic which is destined to 176.16.1.0/24. Any way you should ask network admin

Answer 2

A VPN can be thought of as a tunnel between your application server and your internal network, so that your server can access the internal network as if it were directly connected to it. The tunnel is established from your app server and your internet connected host.

Because you have PCs without Internet connectivity, and you want the scanning to appear to come from your internal host, this will get more complicated. You may need some component of your app to run on the host.