Azure VM-Series licensing questions

future — Mon, 04 Jul 2022 05:00:52 GMT

I'm curious about how Azure's VM-Series licenses are authenticated.

As far as I know, VM-Series licenses are authenticated through CPUID and UUID, which have information in Azure.
We get this through the permissions of Azure Configuration settings.

Is there any documnet where I can get a little bit more detail on this?

Q1) What does CPUID mean?
Q2) What does UUID mean?
Q3) Can multiple VMs with the same CPUID be the same?

Customers want to know in detail how the VM-Series license is authenticated, renewed, and operated in Azure.
Because the customer had to redistribute the firewall due to an issue in Azure before, and at this time, a license issue occurred after the backup process of the previous VM, and it was not registered with Panorama, so it was not possible to normalize the VM-Series license. A detailed explanation is requested.

Although it is a sensitive part, I would like to know the VM-Series license issuance process, authentication process, and operation method. What I know is not enough to explain customer inquiries. Can you help me?

Re: Azure VM-Series licensing questions

LAYER_8 — Fri, 01 Dec 2023 02:33:37 GMT

CPUID and UUID are identifiers that prevent customers from deploying as many boxes as they want without paying.

UUID is based on the physical computer's identifier and the path to the virtual machine's configuration file. (Config file paths will differ per backup)

CPU identification (CPU ID) masks control the CPU features visible to the virtual machine's guest operating system. (Usually the same, although if a public cloud provider moves your infra to multiple places, CPUID may change)

In general, it is possible to have the same CPUID but not UUID. PANW doesn't support native snapshots, you need to export the config or do it through Panorama.

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Azure VM-Series licensing questions

Re: Azure VM-Series licensing questions