FortiGate VDOM

Hello Guys,

First of all I want to say that I am glad to participate in this Forum discussions.

I have a question regarding FortiGate VDOMs use cases

I am working for a client which use FortiGates for firewall solution.

With the current setup they split FortGate into Multiple VDOMs.

Usually they are doing this when site have Two Internet service providers.

root VDOM - Internal Netowork

fw1 VDOM - Primary Internet provider

fw2 VDOM - Secondary Internet provider

Inter-vdom links between root-fw1 and root-fw2

two default routes on the root VDOM (towards fw1 and fw2 VDOMs)one with lower priority towards the preferred LINE.

They are utilizing the secondary provider by configuring static routes on root vdom which are pointing to fw2 VDOM (Some kind of a load-sharing).

In NSE self study guide I've learned that usually you would need to split FortiGate box when you are managed security service provider and you want assign different VDOMs to different customers.

But why and when you would need to do this when the device is totaly dedicated to one customer.

The guys who made this design are no longer working for the company and there is no one who can give me feasible reason why they did it this way.

In my opinion this setup is just adding more complexity because of the InterVDOM routing.

Moreover there is a project for integrating FortiManager and when you have one box with 3 VDOMs FortiManager license counts 3 devices.

I will be very thankful if someone can explain me what can be achieved with this setup which cannot be without VDOMs.

Thanks.