Examining The VTP Protocol, Identifying the Risks of Its Use and Providing Risk Reduction Solutions in The Computer Networks of Offices and Large Organizations

Abstract

Today, one of the challenges of computer networks implemented in large offices and organizations is maintaining the stability and security of networks, as well as the ease and automation of their configuration to save the time and energy of network administrators. The VTP protocol is a tool to ease and reduce the burden of manually configuring changes to VLANs on Cisco switches. However, the use of this protocol, despite having advantages such as automatic configuration and centralized management of VLANs, has great risks such as the complexity of implementation in large networks and the loss of settings in case of wrong configuration. The problem studied in this article is to investigate the characteristics and function of this protocol and to recognize the possible risks and dangers associated with its use. In the following, solutions are provided to reduce these risks so that the benefits of this protocol can be used and at the same time protect the stability and security of the network implemented in the organization. By using this evaluation, network administrators can have an optimal and more informed use of this protocol.