How to Create a TINA VPN Tunnel between F-Series Firewalls

As the TINA protocol offers significant advantages over IPsec, it is the main protocol that is used for VPN connections between Barracuda NextGen F-Series Firewalls. Many of the advanced VPN features, such as Traffic Intelligence, multiple Transports, or WAN Optimization are only supported for TINA Site-to-Site VPN tunnels.

In this article:

You must complete this configuration on both the local and the remote Barracuda NextGen Firewall F-Series by using the respective values below:

Step 1. Configure the TINA Tunnel at Location 1

For the F-Series Firewall at Location 1, configure the network settings and export the public key. For more information on specific settings, see TINA Tunnel Settings

1. Log into the Firewall at Location 1.
2. Go to CONFIGURATION > Configuration Tree > Box > Virtual Servers > your virtual server > Assigned Services > VPN > Site to Site.
3. Click Lock.
4. Click the TINA Tunnels tab.
5. Right-click the table, and select New TINA tunnel.
6. In the Name field, enter the name for the new VPN tunnel.
7. Configure the Basic TINA tunnel settings. For more information, see TINA Tunnel Settings.
   
   • Transport – Select the transport encapsulation: UDP (recommended), TCP, TCP&UDP, ESP, or Routing.
   • Encryption – Select the encryption algorithm: AES, AES256, 3DES, CAST, Blowfish, DES, or Null.
   • Authentication – Select the hashing algorithm: MD5, SHA, SHA256, SHA512, NOHASH, RIPEMD160, or GCM.
   • (optional) TI Classification / TI-ID – For more information, see Traffic Intelligence.
   • (optional) Compression – Select yes to enable VPN compression. Do not use in combination with WAN Optimization.
   • (optional) Use Dynamic Mesh / Dynamic Mesh Timeout – For more information, 
     
   

8. In the Local Networks tab, select the Call Direction. One or both firewalls must be active.

   Configure the NextGen Firewall F-Series with a dynamic IP address to be the active peer. If both firewalls use dynamic IP addresses, a DynDNS service must be used. For more information, see How to Configure VPN Access via a Dynamic WAN IP Address. 

   

9. Click the Local tab, and configure the IP address or Interface used for Tunnel Address:
   
   • First Server IP – First IP address of the virtual server the VPN service is running on.
   • Second Server IP –  Second IP address of the virtual server the VPN service is running on.
   • Dynamic (via routing) – The Barracuda NextGen Firewall F-Series uses a routing table lookup to determine which IP address to use.
   • Explicit List (ordered) – Enter one or more explicit IP addresses. Multiple IP addresses are tried in the listed order.
10. Click the Remote tab, enter one or more IP addresses or a FQDN as the Remote Peer IP Addresses, and click Add.
    
11. In the Remote tab, select the Accepted Ciphers. To use a cipher, the list must match the Encryption settings previously configured.
12. For each local network, enter the Network Address in the Local Networks tab and click Add. E.g., 10.0.10.0/25
13. For each remote network enter the Network Address in the Remote Networks tab and click Add. E.g., 10.0.81.0/24
14. (optional) To propagate the remote VPN network via dynamic routing enable Advertise Route.
    
15. Click on the Identity tab.
16. From the Identification Type list, select Public Key.
17. Click Ex/Import and select Export Public Key to Clipboard.
    
18. Click OK.
19. Click Send Changes and Activate.

Step 2. Create the TINA Tunnel at Location 2

1. Log into the Firewall at Location 2.
2. Go to CONFIGURATION > Configuration Tree > Box > Virtual Servers > your virtual server > Assigned Services > VPN > Site to Site .
3. Click Lock.
4. Click the TINA Tunnels tab.
5. Right-click the table, and select New TINA tunnel.
6. In the Name field, enter the name for the new VPN tunnel.
7. Configure the Basic TINA tunnel settings to match the settings configured for the Location1

8. In the Local Networks tab, select the Call Direction. Make sure that one or both firewalls are set to active.
   

9. Click the Local tab, and configure the IP address or Interface used for Tunnel Address:
   
   1. First Server IP – First IP address of the virtual server the VPN service is running on.
   2. Second Server IP –  Second IP address of the virtual server the VPN service is running on.
   3. Dynamic (via routing) – The Barracuda NextGen Firewall F-Series uses a routing table lookup to determine which IP address to use.
   4. Explicit List (ordered) – Enter one or more explicit IP addresses. Multiple IP addresses are tried in the listed order.
10. Click the Remote tab, enter one or more IP addresses or a FQDN as the Remote Peer IP Addresses, and click Add.
    
11. In the Remote tab, select the Accepted Ciphers. To use a cipher, the list must match the Encryption settings previously configured.
12. For each local network, enter the Network Address in the Local Networks tab and click Add. E.g., 10.0.81.0/24 behind Location 2 NextGen Firewall F-Series.
13. For each remote network, enter the Network Address in the Remote Networks tab and click Add. E.g., 10.0.10.0/25 behind Location1 NextGen Firewall F-Series.
    
14. Click on the Peer Identification tab.
15. Click Ex/Import and select Import from Clipboard.
    
16. Click on the Identity tab.
17. From the Identification Type list, select Public Key.
18. Click Ex/Import and select Export Public Key to Clipboard.
19. Click OK.

20. Click Send Changes and Activate.

Step 3. Import the Public Key for Location 1

The TINA VPN tunnel is not activated until the public key of Location 2 is imported to Location 1.

1. Log into the Firewall at Location 1.
2. Go to CONFIGURATION > Configuration Tree > Box > Virtual Servers > your virtual server > Assigned Services > VPN-Service > Site to Site .
3. Click Lock.
4. Open the configuration for the Site-to-Site tunnel created in Step 1.
5. Click the Peer Identification tab.
6. Click Ex/Import and select Import from Clipboard.
   
7. Click OK.
8. Click Send Changes and Activate. 

After configuring the TINA VPN tunnel on both F-Series Firewalls, you must also create an access rule on both systems to allow access to the remote networks through the VPN tunnel.

Next Step