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Cisco Meraki Documentation

Cisco Secure Access Meraki SD-WAN Configuration Guide

Cisco Secure Access SSE Configuration Guide Edit section

Cisco Secure Access offers a security stack solution from the cloud for internet, SaaS, ZTNA, Remote access connections, etc. Cisco Secure Access acts as a security gateway where 0.0.0.0/0 traffic will be routed for inspection and enforcement prior to internet or site-to-site, private cloud termination.  

This document describes how to configure and monitor Cisco Secure Access peering with the Meraki security appliance (MX/Z platforms).

Prerequisites Edit section

  • Cisco Secure Access account 

  • Meraki MX/Z device (running MX18+ firmware)

  • Meraki MX/Z Site-to-site VPN enabled

Caveats and Considerations 

  • BGP peering over IPsec is not supported with this integration

  • Primary and Backup tunnels are not supported with this integration

  • ECMP/Load balancing is not supported with this integration

Cisco Secure Access Configuration

Go to sse.cisco.com and login with your credentials and follow the steps outlined below.

1. Add a Network Tunnel Group - From the Secure Access console, navigate to Connect > Network Connections.

Network connections Menu
 

  • Select Network Tunnel Groups 

  • Click Add
     

Add Network Tunnel Groups.png

 

  1. Enter the General Settings for your tunnel group: 

  • Give your tunnel group a meaningful name. 

  • Choose a Region. 

  • Choose a Device Type. 

Configure general settings for tunnel group 

  • Click Next

 

  1. Enter the Tunnel ID and Passphrase for your tunnel group: 

  • Tunnel ID Format: Email. 

  • Enter Passphrase  

  • Re Enter Passphrase

Configure tunnel id and passphrase for tunnel group 

  • Click Next

Note: The passphrase must be between 16 and 64 characters in length and contain at least one upper case letter, one lower case letter, and one number. The passphrase cannot include any special characters. 

 

  1. Choose Static routing as the routing Option. 

  • Manually add IP address ranges for this tunnel group. You should add all public and private address ranges for the Meraki Network. 

configure routing for tunnel group

 

  • Click Add

  • Click Save

 

  1. On the Data for Tunnel Setup page, review the network tunnel information for completeness. Click the Download CSV button to save configuration information needed for your Meraki Secure SD-WAN device. 

configuration parameters for tunnel group

Note: This is the only time that your passphrase is displayed

  • Click Done

A Network Tunnel Group will be configured but the Primary and Secondary Hub will be down until a tunnel is established to the Hubs. 

configured tunnel group information

Meraki Secure SD-WAN Configuration

Gather Details from Cisco Secure Access Portal

Information can be taken from the CSV downloaded from step 5 above or from the Data for Tunnel Setup page seen below:  

configuration parameters for tunnel group


On the Meraki Network, Navigate to Site-to-site VPN settings through the Security & SD-WAN > Configure > Site-to-site VPN page.

meraki sdwan site to site vpn configuration

There are three options for configuring the MX-Z's role in the Auto VPN topology:

meraki sdwan hub and spoke configuration

  • Off: The MX-Z device will not participate in site-to-site VPN.

  • Hub (Mesh): The MX-Z device will establish VPN tunnels to all remote Meraki VPN peers that are also configured in this mode, as well as any MX-Z appliances in hub-and-spoke mode that have the MX-Z device configured as a hub.

  • Spoke: This MX-Z device (spoke) will establish direct tunnels only to the specified remote MX-Z devices (hubs). Other spokes will be reachable via their respective hubs unless blocked by site-to-site firewall rules.

Select Hub (Mesh) to enable AutoVPN as this is recommended for the MX peering with the non-Meraki/Cisco Secure Access.
 

You can create Site-to-site VPN tunnels between a Security Appliance or a Teleworker Gateway and Cisco Secure Access under the Non-Meraki VPN peers section on the Security & SD-WAN > Configure > Site-to-site VPN page. Simply click "Add a peer" and enter the following information:

Non Meraki VPN peer configuration

  • Name—Provide a meaningful name for the tunnel. 

  • IKE Version—Select IKEv2. 

  • IPsec policies—Choose the predefined Umbrella configuration, see Supported IPsec Parameters

    Meraki SDWAN IPsec policy configuration
  • Public IP—IP address to connect to Secure Access Network Tunnel Group Primary Data Center IP

  • Local ID—The Primary Tunnel ID for the Network Tunnel Group. 

  • Remote ID—Leave this blank

  • Private subnets— Configure a default route 0.0.0.0/0

  • ​​Preshared secret—The Passphrase for the Network Tunnel Group created in Secure Access

  • Availability— Add network tag for the MX network appliance that should build the tunnel to Secure Access. "All Networks" tag will configure all MXs in your Dashboard Organization to establish a tunnel to Secure Access

  • Click UpdateSave

The Network Tunnel Group will move from Disconnected Status to Warning. This change could take several minutes and may require a test ping described in step 2 below.  Traffic needs to be generated from the MX through the Secure Access tunnel for the tunnel to be established.

Established remote site tunnel to Secure Access

The Network Tunnel Group will never move from Warning Status to Connected. This is because the Network Tunnel Group is designed to have a Primary and Secondary tunnel connected to each Hub for failover.  Traffic will pass to the Primary Hub even if the Network Tunnel Group status is Warning. 

Primary and Backup Tunnels

Meraki MX/Z platforms do not support native primary and backup peering at this time, but we have created an API configuration guide as a workaround. For more information, read here.

Non-Meraki VPN Firewall  Edit section

You can add firewall rules to control what traffic is allowed to pass through the VPN tunnel. These rules will apply to outbound VPN traffic to/from all MX-Z appliances in the Organization that participate in site-to-site VPN. These rules are configured in the same manner as the Layer 3 firewall rules described on the Firewall Settings page of this documentation. Note that VPN Firewall rules will not apply to inbound traffic or to traffic that is not passing through the VPN.

Serviceability  Edit section

Event Logs   Edit section

If you have any issues or would like to know more about the Cisco Secure Access peering details, navigate to Network-wide > Monitor > Event log 

  • Select Event type Include - Non-Meraki VPN Negotiation

Eventlog.pngNon Meraki VPN Eventlog

 Packet Captures    Edit section

The following options are available for a packet capture on MX/Z platforms:

Packet captureInternet Interface packet capture

  • Appliance: The appliance the capture will run on.

  • Interface: Select the interface to run the capture on; the interface names will vary depending on the appliance configuration. A few examples of interfaces you may see are:

    • Internet 1 or Internet 2 - Capture traffic on one active WAN uplink.  Internet 2 will only appear if there is a second WAN link. 

    • LAN - Captures traffic from all LAN ports

    • Cellular - Captures cellular traffic from the integrated cellular interface.  This does not apply to USB modems.

    • Site-to-Site VPN - Captures AutoVPN traffic (MX/Z to MX/Z only).  This does not apply to Non-Meraki VPN peers.

  • Output: Select how the capture should be displayed; view output or download .pcap.

  • Verbosity: Select the level of the packet capture (only available when viewing the output directly to Dashboard).

  • Ignore: Optionally ignore capturing broadcast/multicast traffic.

  • Filter expressions: Apply a capture filter.

To capture packets, select the WAN interface and use the filter expressions for UDP 500 for Phase 1 or UDP 4500 for Phase 2. 

 API  Edit section

The Meraki dashboard API is an interface for software to interact directly with the Meraki cloud platform and Meraki-managed devices. The API contains a set of tools known as endpoints for building software and applications that communicate with the Meraki dashboard for use cases such as provisioning, bulk configuration changes, monitoring, and role-based access controls. The dashboard API is a modern, RESTful API using HTTPS requests to a URL and JSON as a human-readable format. The dashboard API is an open-ended tool that can be used for many purposes.

For more information, read here.

24/7 Support  Edit section

Cisco Meraki Support is available 24/7 to Enterprise customers for assistance with resolving network issues and providing answers to questions not covered by the documentation. For more information, read here.

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