Suggestions or help needed: forwarding broadcasts with a custom ip-helper

Pieninck — Mon, 27 Feb 2023 11:04:50 GMT

Hello all,

we have recently started using interactive boards that can display the screen of a connected client in various ways: airplay, chromecast, etc. and also by means of a manufacturer's own tool.

The tool first creates a list on the client of all boards accessible on the local network. To do this, it sends broadcasts on UDP port 6618 to the local broadcast address. Of course, this does not allow it to reach the boards in other networks / VLANs, but this is desired. The client also tries to find boards via a broadcast on UDP 6619 to the local broadcast address. Note: All networks concerned are connected to a Palo Alto firewall.

The manufacturer writes in his manual: "This could be solved by configuring the network infrastructure to forward broadcasts to other network segments or specified hosts, i.e. by defining a custom IP forward protocol (UDP 6618) and defining an IP helper address on the relevant interface. The IP helper address would either: point to the IP address of the receiver, or the broadcast address of the destination network."

I can find approaches to implement this for other vendors, but not for Palo Alto so far. How can this be implemented on a Palo Alto firewall?

Thanks for your help!
Matthias

Re: Suggestions or help needed: forwarding broadcasts with a custom ip-helper

JayGolf — Wed, 01 Mar 2023 06:41:12 GMT

Hi @Pieninck ,

The only feature that comes to mind is IP directed broadcast for SD WAN. I found a couple of threads that might be useful:

https://live.paloaltonetworks.com/t5/general-topics/ip-directed-broadcast/td-p/27608

https://live.paloaltonetworks.com/t5/general-topics/how-to-configure-wol-forwarding-through-a-vpn-tunnel/m-p/74732#M41773

topic Re: Suggestions or help needed: forwarding broadcasts with a custom ip-helper in General Topics

Suggestions or help needed: forwarding broadcasts with a custom ip-helper

Re: Suggestions or help needed: forwarding broadcasts with a custom ip-helper