Netskope's default steering configuration covers standard HTTP (port 80) and HTTPS (port 443) traffic.
When a web application is served on a non-standard port such as 6443, the Netskope Client will not steer it by default. To ensure that traffic on port 6443 is both steered and decrypted, the administrator must enable the
"Steer non-standard ports" option in the Steering Configuration and then add the specific domain and port as a non-standard port entry. This configuration instructs the Netskope Client to intercept and forward traffic on that port to the Netskope proxy for inspection. No additional Real-time Protection policy is required solely for enabling steering on this port, as existing applicable policies will be enforced once traffic is properly steered to the platform.

Fingerprint classification in Netskope DLP is designed to identify documents that are derivatives of a known baseline template. In this scenario, the blank patient form represents the template, and any form with patient data filled in would be considered a derivative. Netskope's fingerprinting engine creates a hash of the blank form and then uses similarity matching to detect documents that share structural characteristics with the template but contain additional user-filled content. This makes fingerprinting the correct DLP rule type for this use case, as it can reliably distinguish between blank forms which are safe to share and completed forms which are confidential. Dictionary-based or Exact Match rules are designed to detect specific text patterns or known data values, not document template similarity or partial completion.

For organizations running workloads across multiple AWS VPCs and needing to steer machine-generated traffic to Netskope with minimal tunnel overhead, the optimal approach is to use IPsec tunnels from AWS Transit Gateway. The Transit Gateway acts as a centralized network hub that connects multiple VPCs, enabling traffic from all connected VPCs to be routed through a single set of IPsec tunnels to Netskope. This significantly reduces the number of tunnels required compared to creating individual tunnels from each VPC separately. GRE tunnels are not natively supported by AWS Transit Gateway in the same manner as IPsec, making IPsec the preferred protocol for this architecture. Using per-VPC Virtual Private Gateways would result in one tunnel set per VPC, greatly increasing operational complexity and management overhead.

Netskope supports integration with third-party Data Loss Prevention engines that communicate using the Internet Content Adaptation Protocol (ICAP). The Netskope Adapter is the platform component that enables this integration by acting as an ICAP server, receiving content from Netskope's inline proxy and forwarding it to the external DLP engine for inspection. The Adapter then receives the DLP response and relays the enforcement decision back to the Netskope platform. This is distinct from Cloud Exchange, which handles log and threat intelligence sharing workflows, and the Secure Forwarder, which is used to steer traffic from on- premises environments without a client. The On-Premises Log Parser (OPLP) is used for ingesting log data from on-premises firewalls or proxies into Netskope telemetry.

IPsec tunnel-based steering is well-suited for scenarios where installing the Netskope Client on the traffic source is not feasible or practical. Two specific use cases where IPsec tunnels are the appropriate design consideration are: guest Wi-Fi network users, where the network serves unmanaged and transient devices that cannot have software installed or configured; and Internet-connected IoT devices, which typically run lightweight embedded operating systems that do not support endpoint software installation. For corporate- managed Mac and Windows devices, the Netskope Client is the preferred and more feature-rich steering method. Remote unmanaged Windows PCs could use explicit proxy or other alternatives. IPsec tunnels handle network-level traffic steering without requiring any individual device configuration, making them ideal for these scenarios.