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IETF RFC 7498
Last modified on Tuesday, April 14th, 2015
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Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) P. Quinn, Ed.
Request for Comments: 7498 Cisco Systems, Inc.
Category: Informational T. Nadeau, Ed.
ISSN: 2070-1721 Brocade
April 2015
Problem Statement for Service Function Chaining
 Abstract
This document provides an overview of the issues associated with the
deployment of service functions (such as firewalls, load balancers,
etc.) in large-scale environments. The term "service function
chaining" is used to describe the definition and instantiation of an
ordered list of instances of such service functions, and the
subsequent "steering" of traffic flows through those service
functions.
The set of enabled service function chains reflects operator service
offerings and is designed in conjunction with application delivery
and service and network policy.
This document also identifies several key areas that the Service
Function Chaining (SFC) working group will investigate to guide its
architectural and protocol work and associated documents.
Status of This Memo
This document is not an Internet Standards Track specification; it is
published for informational purposes.
This document is a product of the Internet Engineering Task Force
(IETF). It represents the consensus of the IETF community. It has
received public review and has been approved for publication by the
Internet Engineering Steering Group (IESG). Not all documents
approved by the IESG are a candidate for any level of Internet
Standard; see Section 2 of RFC 5741.
Information about the current status of this document, any errata,
and how to provide feedback on it may be obtained at
http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/RFC 7498.
Quinn & Nadeau Informational PAGE 1 
RFC 7498 SFC Problem Statement April 2015
Copyright Notice
Copyright (c) 2015 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the
document authors. All rights reserved.
This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal
Provisions Relating to IETF Documents
(http://trustee.ietf.org/license-info) in effect on the date of
publication of this document. Please review these documents
carefully, as they describe your rights and restrictions with respect
to this document. Code Components extracted from this document must
include Simplified BSD License text as described in Section 4.e of
the Trust Legal Provisions and are provided without warranty as
described in the Simplified BSD License.
Table of Contents
1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
1.1. Definition of Terms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
2. Problem Space . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
2.1. Topological Dependencies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
2.2. Configuration Complexity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
2.3. Constrained High Availability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
2.4. Consistent Ordering of Service Functions . . . . . . . . 6
2.5. Application of Service Policy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
2.6. Transport Dependence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
2.7. Elastic Service Delivery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
2.8. Traffic Selection Criteria . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
2.9. Limited End-to-End Service Visibility . . . . . . . . . . 7
2.10. Classification/Reclassification per Service Function . . 7
2.11. Symmetric Traffic Flows . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
2.12. Multi-vendor Service Functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
3. Service Function Chaining . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
3.1. Service Overlay . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
3.2. Service Classification . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
3.3. SFC Encapsulation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
4. Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
5. Informative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
Contributors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
Authors' Addresses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
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RFC 7498 SFC Problem Statement April 2015
1. Introduction
The delivery of end-to-end services often requires various service
functions including traditional network service functions (for
example, firewalls and server load balancers), as well as
application-specific features such as HTTP header manipulation.
Service functions may be delivered within the context of an isolated
user (e.g., a tenant) or shared amongst many users or user groups.
Current deployment models for service functions are often tightly
coupled to network topology and physical resources, thus resulting in
relatively rigid and static deployments. The static nature of such
deployments greatly reduces and, in many cases, limits the ability of
an operator to introduce new or modify existing services and/or
service functions. Furthermore there is a cascading effect: changing
one or more elements of a service function chain often affects other
elements in the chain and/or the network elements used to construct
the chain.
This issue is particular acute in elastic service environments that
require relatively rapid creation, destruction, or movement of
physical or virtual service functions or network elements.
Additionally, the transition to virtual platforms requires an agile
service insertion model that supports elastic and very granular
service delivery, post facto modification, and the movement of
service functions and application workloads in the existing network.
The service insertion model must also retain the network and service
policies and the ability to easily bind service policy to granular
information such as per-subscriber state.
This document outlines the problems encountered with existing service
deployment models for Service Function Chaining (SFC), which is often
referred to simply as "service chaining" (in this document, the terms
will be used interchangeably). Section 3 of this document highlights
three key areas of WG focus for investigating solutions that address
the current problems. The document highlights three key areas of WG
focus for addressing the issues highlighted in this document that
will form the basis for the possible WG solutions that address the
current problems.
1.1. Definition of Terms
Classification: Locally instantiated matching of traffic flows
against policy for subsequent application of the required set of
network service functions. The policy may be customer, network,
or service specific.
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RFC 7498 SFC Problem Statement April 2015
Network Overlay: A logical network built, via virtual links or
packet encapsulation, over an existing network (the underlay).
Network Service: An offering provided by an operator that is
delivered using one or more service functions. This may also be
referred to as a composite service. The term "service" is used to
denote a "network service" in the context of this document.
Note: Beyond this document, the term "service" is overloaded with
varying definitions. For example, to some a service is an
offering composed of several elements within the operator's
network, whereas for others a service, or more specifically a
network service, is a discrete element such as a firewall.
Traditionally, such services (in the latter sense) host a set of
service functions and have a network locator where the service is
hosted.
Service Function: A function that is responsible for specific
treatment of received packets. A service function can act at
various layers of a protocol stack (e.g., at the network layer or
other OSI layers). As a logical component, a service function can
be realized as a virtual element or be embedded in a physical
network element. One or more service functions can be embedded in
the same network element. Multiple occurrences of the service
function can exist in the same administrative domain.
A non-exhaustive list of service functions includes: firewalls,
WAN and application acceleration, Deep Packet Inspection (DPI),
server load balancers, NAT44 [RFC 3022], NAT64 [RFC 6146], HTTP
header enrichment functions, and TCP optimizers.
The generic term "L4-L7 services" is often used to describe many
service functions.
Service Function Chain (SFC): A service function chain defines an
ordered or partially ordered set of abstract service functions
(SFs) and ordering constraints that must be applied to packets,
frames, and/or flows selected as a result of classification. An
example of an abstract service function is a firewall. The
implied order may not be a linear progression as the architecture
allows for SFCs that copy to more than one branch, and also allows
for cases where there is flexibility in the order in which service
functions need to be applied. The term "service chain" is often
used as shorthand for "service function chain".
Service Overlay: An overlay network created for the purpose of
forwarding data to required service functions.
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RFC 7498 SFC Problem Statement April 2015
Service Topology: The service overlay connectivity forms a service
topology.
2. Problem Space
The following points describe aspects of existing service deployments
that are problematic and that the SFC working group aims to address.
2.1. Topological Dependencies
Network service deployments are often coupled to network topology,
whether it be physical, virtualized, or a hybrid of the two. For
example, use of a firewall requires that traffic flow through the
firewall, which means placing the firewall on the network path (often
via creation of VLANs) or architecting the network topology to steer
traffic through the firewall. Such dependency imposes constraints on
service delivery, potentially inhibiting the network operator from
optimally utilizing service resources, and reduces flexibility. This
limits scale, capacity, and redundancy across network resources.
These topologies serve only to "insert" the service function (i.e.,
ensure that traffic traverses a service function); they are not
required from a native packet delivery perspective. For example,
firewalls often require an "in" and "out" Layer 2 segment and adding
a new firewall requires changing the topology (i.e., adding new Layer
2 segments and/or IP subnets).
As more service functions are required -- often with strict ordering
-- topology changes are needed in "front" and "behind" each service
function, resulting in complex network changes and device
configuration. In such topologies, all traffic, whether a service
function needs to be applied or not, often passes through the same
strict order.
The topological coupling limits placement and selection of service
functions: service functions are "fixed" in place by topology.
Therefore, placement and service function selection that take into
account network topology information such as load, new links, or
traffic engineering are often not possible.
A common example is web servers using a server load balancer as the
default gateway. When the web service responds to non-load-balanced
traffic (e.g., administrative or backup operations), all traffic from
the server must traverse the load balancer, forcing network
administrators to create complex routing schemes or additional
interfaces to provide an alternate topology.
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RFC 7498 SFC Problem Statement April 2015
2.2. Configuration Complexity
A direct consequence of topological dependencies is the complexity of
the entire configuration, specifically in deploying service function
chains. Simple actions such as changing the order of the service
functions in a service function chain require changes to the logical
and/or physical topology. However, network operators are hesitant to
make changes to the network once services are installed, configured,
and deployed in production environments for fear of misconfiguration
and consequent downtime. All of this leads to very static service
delivery deployments. Furthermore, the speed at which these
topological changes can be made is not rapid or dynamic enough, as it
often requires manual intervention or use of slow provisioning
systems.
2.3. Constrained High Availability
Since traffic reaches many service functions based on network
topology, alternate or redundant service functions must be placed in
the same topology as the primary service.
An effect of topological dependency is that the availability of
service functions is constrained.
2.4. Consistent Ordering of Service Functions
Service functions are typically independent; service function_1
(SF1)...service function_n (SFn) are unrelated, and there is no
notion at the service layer that SF1 occurs before SF2. However, to
an administrator, many service functions have a strict ordering that
must be in place, yet the administrator has no consistent way to
impose and verify the ordering of the service functions that are used
to deliver a given service. Furthermore, altering the order of a
deployed chain is complex and cumbersome.
2.5. Application of Service Policy
Service functions rely on topology information such as VLANs or
packet classification/reclassification to determine service policy
selection, i.e., the service function specific action taken.
Topology information is increasingly less viable due to scaling,
tenancy, and complexity reasons. Topology-centric information often
does not convey adequate information to the service functions,
forcing functions to individually perform more granular
classification. In other words, the topology information is not
granular enough, and its semantics is often overloaded.
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RFC 7498 SFC Problem Statement April 2015
2.6. Transport Dependence
Service functions can and will be deployed in networks with a range
of network transports, including network under and overlays, such as
Ethernet, Generic Routing Encapsulation (GRE), Virtual eXtensible
Local Area Network (VXLAN), MPLS, etc. The coupling of service
functions to topology may require service functions to support many
transport encapsulations or for a transport gateway function to be
present.
2.7. Elastic Service Delivery
Given that the current state of the art for adding/removing service
functions largely centers around VLANs and routing changes, rapid
changes to the deployed service capacity (increasing or decreasing)
can be hard to realize due to the risk and complexity of VLANs and/or
routing modifications.
2.8. Traffic Selection Criteria
Traffic selection is coarse; that is, all traffic on a particular
segment traverses all service functions whether or not the traffic
requires service enforcement. This lack of traffic selection is
largely due to the topological nature of service deployment since the
forwarding topology dictates how (and what) data traverses which
service function(s). In some deployments, more granular traffic
selection is achieved using policy routing or access control
filtering. This results in operationally complex configurations and
is still relatively coarse and inflexible.
2.9. Limited End-to-End Service Visibility
Troubleshooting service-related issues is a complex process that
involves both network-specific and service-specific expertise. This
is especially the case when service function chains span multiple
data centers or cross administrative boundaries. Furthermore, the
physical and virtual environments (network and service) can be highly
divergent in terms of topology, and that topological variance adds to
these challenges.
2.10. Classification/Reclassification per Service Function
Classification occurs at each service function, independent from
previously applied service functions since there are limited
mechanisms to share the detailed classification information between
services. The classification functionality often differs between
service functions, and service functions may not leverage the
classification results from other service functions.
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RFC 7498 SFC Problem Statement April 2015
2.11. Symmetric Traffic Flows
Service function chains may be unidirectional or bidirectional
depending on the state requirements of the service functions. In a
unidirectional chain, traffic is passed through a set of service
functions in one forwarding direction only. Bidirectional chains
require traffic to be passed through a set of service functions in
both forwarding directions. Many common service functions such as
DPI and firewalls often require bidirectional chaining in order to
ensure flow state is consistent.
Existing service deployment models provide a static approach to
realizing forward and reverse associations of service function
chains, most often requiring complex configuration of each network
device throughout the SFC. In other words, the same complex network
configuration must be in place for both "directions" of the traffic,
effectively doubling the configuration and associated testing.
Further, if partial symmetry is required (i.e., only some of the
services in the chain required symmetry), the network configuration
complexity increases since the operator must ensure that the
exceptions -- the services that do not need the symmetry flow -- are
handled correctly via unique configuration to account for their
requirements.
2.12. Multi-vendor Service Functions
Deploying service functions from multiple vendors often requires per-
vendor expertise (insertion models differ, common attributes are few,
and inter-vendor service functions do not share information), hence
standards are needed to ensure interoperability.
3. Service Function Chaining
Service function chaining aims to address the aforementioned problems
associated with service deployment. Concretely, the SFC working
group will investigate solutions that address the following elements.
3.1. Service Overlay
Service function chaining utilizes a service-specific overlay that
creates the service topology. The service overlay provides service
function connectivity, built "on top" of the existing network
topology. It allows operators to use whatever overlay or underlay
they prefer to create a path between service functions and to locate
service functions in the network as needed.
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RFC 7498 SFC Problem Statement April 2015
Within the service topology, service functions can be viewed as
resources for consumption and an arbitrary topology constructed to
connect those resources in a required order. Adding new service
functions to the topology is easily accomplished, and no underlying
network changes are required.
Lastly, the service overlay can provide service-specific information
needed for troubleshooting service-related issues.
3.2. Service Classification
Classification is used to select which traffic enters a service
overlay. The granularity of the classification varies based on
device capabilities, customer requirements, and services offered.
Initial classification determines the service function chain required
to process the traffic. Subsequent classification can be used within
a given service function chain to alter the sequence of service
functions applied. Symmetric classification ensures that forward and
reverse chains are in place. Similarly, asymmetric -- relative to
required service function -- chains can be achieved via service
classification.
3.3. SFC Encapsulation
The SFC encapsulation enables the creation of a service chain in the
data plane and can convey information about the chain such as chain
identification and OAM status.
The SFC encapsulation also carries data-plane metadata that provides
the ability to exchange information between logical classification
points and service functions (and vice versa) and between service
functions. Metadata is not used as forwarding information to deliver
packets along the service overlay.
Metadata can include the result of antecedent classification and/or
information from external sources. Service functions utilize
metadata, as required, for localized policy decisions.
In addition to sharing of information, the use of metadata addresses
several of the issues raised in Section 2, most notably by decoupling
policy from the network topology, and by removing the need for
classification (and reclassification) per service function as
described in Section 2.10.
A common approach to service metadata creates a foundation for
interoperability between service functions, regardless of vendor.
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RFC 7498 SFC Problem Statement April 2015
4. Security Considerations
Although this problem statement does not introduce any protocols,
when considering service function chaining, the three main areas
begin investigated (see Section 3) by the WG have security aspects
that warrant consideration.
Service Overlay: The service overlay will be constructed using
existing transport protocols (e.g., MPLS, VXLAN) and as such is
subject to the security specifics of the transport selected. If
an operator requires authenticity and/or confidentiality in the
service overlay, a transport (e.g., IPsec) that provides such
functionally can be used.
Classification: Since classification is used to select the
appropriate service overlay and the required service encapsulation
details, classification policy must be both accurate and trusted.
Conveying the policy to an SFC edge node (a node that forms the
logical boundary of an SFC domain) may be done via a multitude of
methods depending on an operator's existing provisioning practices
and security posture.
Additionally, traffic entering the SFC domain and being classified
may be encrypted, thus limiting the granularity of classification.
The use of pervasive encryption varies based on type of traffic,
environment, and level of operator control. For instance, a large
enterprise can mandate how encryption is used by its users,
whereas a broadband provider likely does not have the ability to
do so.
The use of encrypted traffic, however, does not obviate the need
for SFC (nor the problems associated with current deployment
models described herein); rather, when encrypted traffic must be
classified, the granularity of such classification must adapt. In
such cases, service overlay selection might occur using outer
(i.e., unencrypted) header information (in the presence of
encryption) or external information about the packets.
SFC Encapsulation: As described in Section 3, the SFC encapsulation
carries information about the SFC and data-plane metadata.
Depending on the environment and security posture, the SFC
encapsulation might need to be authenticated and/or encrypted.
The use of an appropriate overlay transport (as described above)
can provide data-plane confidentiality and authenticity.
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RFC 7498 SFC Problem Statement April 2015
The exchange of SFC encapsulation data such as metadata must
originate from trusted source(s). Also, if needed, authentication
and confidentiality protection should be provided during the
exchange to the various SFC nodes.
SFC and Multi-tenancy: If tenant isolation is required in an SFC
deployment, an appropriate network transport overlay that provides
adequate isolation and identification can be used. Additionally,
tenancy might be used in the selection of the appropriate service
chain; however, as stated, the network overlay is still required
to provide transport isolation. SF deployment and how specific
SFs might or might not be allocated per tenant are outside the
scope of this document.
The SFC Architecture document [SFC-ARCH] presents a more complete
review of the security implications of a complete SFC architecture.
5. Informative References
[RFC 3022] Srisuresh, P. and K. Egevang, "Traditional IP Network
Address Translator (Traditional NAT)", RFC 3022, January
2001, <http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/RFC 3022>.
[RFC 6146] Bagnulo, M., Matthews, P., and I. van Beijnum, "Stateful
NAT64: Network Address and Protocol Translation from IPv6
Clients to IPv4 Servers", RFC 6146, April 2011,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/RFC 6146>.
[SFC-ARCH]
Halpern, J. and C. Pignataro, "Service Function Chaining
(SFC) Architecture", Work in Progress, draft-ietf-sfc-
architecture-07, March 2015.
Acknowledgments
The authors would like to thank David Ward, Rex Fernando, David
McDysan, Jamal Hadi Salim, Charles Perkins, Andre Beliveau, Joel
Halpern, and Jim French for their reviews and comments.
Additionally, the authors would like to thank the IESG and Benjamin
Kaduk for their detailed reviews and suggestions.
Quinn & Nadeau Informational PAGE 11
RFC 7498 SFC Problem Statement April 2015
Contributors
The following people are active contributors to this document and
have provided review, content and concepts (listed alphabetically by
surname):
Puneet Agarwal
Broadcom
EMail: pagarwal@broadcom.com
Mohamed Boucadair
France Telecom
EMail: mohamed.boucadair@orange.com
Abhishek Chauhan
Citrix
EMail: Abhishek.Chauhan@citrix.com
Uri Elzur
Intel
EMail: uri.elzur@intel.com
Kevin Glavin
Riverbed
EMail: Kevin.Glavin@riverbed.com
Ken Gray
Cisco Systems
EMail: kegray@cisco.com
Jim Guichard
Cisco Systems
EMail:jguichar@cisco.com
Christian Jacquenet
France Telecom
EMail: christian.jacquenet@orange.com
Surendra Kumar
Cisco Systems
EMail: smkumar@cisco.com
Nic Leymann
Deutsche Telekom
EMail: n.leymann@telekom.de
Quinn & Nadeau Informational PAGE 12
RFC 7498 SFC Problem Statement April 2015
Darrel Lewis
Cisco Systems
EMail: darlewis@cisco.com
Rajeev Manur
Broadcom
EMail:rmanur@broadcom.com
Brad McConnell
Rackspace
EMail: bmcconne@rackspace.com
Carlos Pignataro
Cisco Systems
EMail: cpignata@cisco.com
Michael Smith
Cisco Systems
EMail: michsmit@cisco.com
Navindra Yadav
Cisco Systems
EMail: nyadav@cisco.com
Authors' Addresses
Paul Quinn (editor)
Cisco Systems, Inc.
EMail: paulq@cisco.com
Thomas Nadeau (editor)
Brocade
EMail: tnadeau@lucidvision.com
Quinn & Nadeau Informational PAGE 13
RFC TOTAL SIZE: 28970 bytes
PUBLICATION DATE: Tuesday, April 14th, 2015
LEGAL RIGHTS: The IETF Trust (see BCP 78)
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