How do I configure a Personal Firewall / Router for my Blackboard Collaborate web conferencing or Elluminate Live! session?
When using Blackboard Collaborate web conferencing or Elluminate Live!, you may need to configure or confirm settings in your Personal Firewall. We have included information for the several popular firewall applications. If the personal firewall application you are using is not in the list, see the General Tips below.
If your Personal Firewall is not listed in the above, here are a few general steps that you can use to configure your firewall.
Since most routers (for both wireless and wired connections) are shipped with a firewall enabled, you may have to configure them to allow web conferencing or Elluminate Live! traffic through. You may need to do this by allowing access on the specified ports, allowing access to the previously specified application or allowing access to hosts listed below. Configuration differs between routers so we advise checking the manual the shipped with your router and using the following information as supplement.
Since Blackboard Collaborate uses dynamic server assignment, it is not possible to state in advance precisely which server will host a session. This means the IP Address is known only when the session actually starts. Therefore, you must ensure firewalls (and proxy systems) allow access to the entire set of Blackboard Collaborate servers using the following domains and IP Address ranges:
NA-SAS (Domain = elluminate.com)
Current IP Addresses:
Additional IP Addresses to be added on March 2, 2013:
EU SAS (Doman = bb.collab.com)
Enabling access to all of the address blocks listed above will reduce the impact of any configuration changes that Blackboard Collaborate might make.
Please note that Blackboard Collaborate Web Conferencing connects on one of these TCP ports:
Web Conferencing establishes a connection through these ports. Once this connection has been made it will remain open and transfer all communication through a proprietary protocol called the Collaborative Communication Framework (CCF), which is layered on a TCP transport protocol.
Note for ELM users: If you are using a Hosted ELM instance you must connect to web conferencing sessions on port 2187 since port 80 is reserved for webpage traffic.
This is also true if you have installed your ELM server on the same machine as your Blackboard Collaborate web conferencing server because by default your ELM server is installed to listen for web traffic on port 80 and therefore can’t establish an web conferencing connection on that port.
Note for Blackboard Collaborate Mobile users: If you are using Blackboard Collaborate Mobile you must connect to web conferencing sessions on port 2187.
Configure your network's firewall and web content filters to allow the download of both JNLP files (or content types) and Java application archive (JAR) files. Also configure users' client systems to allow the download, installation, and execution of Java network applications.
For more information, and access to a 24-hour Configuration Room you can use to test your ability to login to a Blackboard Collaborate session, please click here.
Link to this article: http://support.blackboardcollaborate.com/ics/support/default.asp?deptID=8336&task=knowledge&questionID=45
How do I configure my firewall for Elluminate Live!