Cisco Meraki and Umbrella Integration on MX and MR

There are two ways that the Cisco Umbrella DNS service can be integrated with a Cisco Meraki network. 

1) Meraki MX Integration with an existing (or new) Cisco Umbrella DNS subscription

and / or

2) Meraki MR Advanced + Upgrade Licences with Cisco Umbrella integration 

1) Meraki MX

Integrating the Meraki dashboard and Umbrella DNS allows clients connected behind Meraki security appliances or access points to have their DNS traffic filtered through Cisco's Umbrella DNS service. 

This integration allows administrators to easily apply and modify DNS-based filtering rules to multiple groups of clients on their network by simply assigning a filtering policy to a specific Meraki group policy or SSID.

Once assigned, all DNS requests from clients included under that policy will be automatically redirected to Cisco's Umbrella DNS service where it will be checked against the appropriate policy configured for the Network Device in the Umbrella dashboard.

There are specific instructions on how to Integrate the MX with an Umbrella subscription and this requires a specific firmware version on the MX.  For more information see you can read about it here.

Reach out to us if you'd like a quote for a Cisco Umbrella Subscription that you can use with your Meraki MX Security Appliance, its a relatively inexpensive way to easily improve the security of your network and a must have in today's world!

2) Meraki MR 

The Meraki MR Advanced + Upgrade Licenses with Cisco Umbrella integration enables Meraki administrators to assign predefined Umbrella content filtering and security policies to an SSID or Group Policy directly from the dashboard and removes the need to integrate with an existing Umbrella dashboard or Umbrella account.

Once Umbrella policies are assigned, all DNS requests from wireless clients will be intercepted by the upstream MR access point and redirected to Cisco's Umbrella DNS resolvers for evaluation. That DNS lookup either resolves successfully, allowing the client to connect to the requested web page, or gets blocked which redirects the client to an Umbrella block page.