Weitverkehrsnetzen

Weitverkehrsnetzen, commonly referred to as WANs, are telecommunications networks that connect geographically dispersed locations. They enable the transmission of data, voice, and video over large distances and form the backbone for linking corporate sites, data centers, cloud services, and access to the Internet. WANs operate across national and international borders and rely on public and private carrier networks.

Architecture and technologies: WANs use a layered architecture consisting of edge, aggregation, and core networks. Transmission media include fiber, copper, wireless, and satellite links. Typical connectivity options are dedicated lines (Leased Lines), MPLS-based IP networks, VPNs over the Internet, and SD-WAN solutions that flexibly connect branch offices to cloud services. Topologies range from point-to-point and hub-and-spoke to full mesh, often combining private and public networks in hybrid configurations.

Characteristics and management: Key attributes are geographic reach, variable latency, and scalable bandwidth—from megabits to terabits per second in large deployments. Reliability, redundancy, and quality of service are essential considerations. Carrier service levels (SLAs), routing policies, and standards such as BGP influence performance. Today IP-based WANs dominate, while older circuit-switched, Frame Relay, and ATM technologies have largely been phased out. Security measures include IPsec encryption, VPNs, firewalls, and network segmentation; operational management covers monitoring, configuration management, and change control.

Applications: Weitverkehrsnetzen enable corporate connectivity, remote access for employees, inter-site communication, and interconnection to data centers and cloud providers. WAN optimization and traffic management help maintain performance for cloud-based and data-intensive applications, making them a critical component of modern enterprise IT infrastructure.