Azure Private Link Service Overview

Azure Private Link service allows you to access Azure Platform as a Service (PaaS) and Azure hosted customer-owned/partner services from within your virtual network privately. Data transfer between your virtual network and the service over the Azure backbone network avoids exposure to the public internet.

What is Azure Private Link Service?

Azure Private Link service is a network interface that connects privately to a service, powered by Azure Private Link. It enables you to provision a new Azure service that is consumed from Azure Private Link. The service is exposed via a Private Endpoint in the consumer's virtual network. The Private Link service is the abstraction of the service provider's service.

Key Benefits:

  • Secure Data Exchange: All traffic travels through the Azure backbone network, eliminating exposure to the public internet.
  • Simplified Management: Centralized control and management of network access to your services.
  • Reduced Network Complexity: Avoids complex VNet peering, VPNs, or firewalls for private connectivity.
  • High Availability: Leverages Azure's robust infrastructure for reliable access.

How it Works

The Private Link service acts as a bridge between your virtual network and the service you want to access privately.

  1. Service Provider: Exposes their service (e.g., Azure SQL Database, Storage Account, or a custom application) behind a Private Link service.
  2. Service Consumer: Creates a Private Endpoint in their virtual network. This Private Endpoint gets a private IP address from the consumer's virtual network.
  3. Connection: The Private Endpoint connects to the Private Link service. Traffic from the consumer's virtual network is routed through this secure connection to the service.
Private Link Architecture Diagram Service Consumer View Service Provider View

Use Cases

Private Link service is ideal for various scenarios:

  • Connecting to Azure PaaS services (e.g., Azure SQL Database, Azure Storage, Azure Key Vault) from an on-premises network or another Azure region without traversing the internet.
  • Accessing customer-owned or partner services hosted in Azure privately from your virtual network.
  • Building secure, hybrid cloud solutions.
  • Enhancing security for sensitive data by ensuring it stays within the Azure network.

Key Concepts

  • Private Endpoint: A network interface that connects privately and securely to a service.
  • Private Link Service: An abstraction of your service that is exposed through Azure Private Link.
  • Azure Private Link: A service that provides a private endpoint to Azure services.

Getting Started

To implement Azure Private Link Service, you'll need to:

  1. Provision your service (e.g., Azure Load Balancer, Azure SQL Database).
  2. Create a Private Link Service that points to your service.
  3. Consumers create Private Endpoints in their virtual networks to connect to your Private Link Service.

For detailed configuration steps, please refer to the official Azure documentation.