Out-of band (OOB) access to critical infrastructure for reconfiguration or repair was pioneered more than 30 years ago. It began as a DIY solution where engineers used terminal servers, repurposed server computers or routers with serial ports to access their infrastructure. Reverse telnet (later reverse SSH) functionality allowed serial over Ethernet redirection and command line/terminal access to the device console.
Fifteen years ago, OOB experienced a massive transformation resulting from the growth of crammed data closets, machine rooms and sophisticated data centers. Due to the density and wide array of critical IT, networking and power infrastructure, tens, hundreds and thousands of serial consoles needed to be accessed and monitored to keep the corporate IT engine running. To cope with this, (more…)