Niagara Networks Network TAP is a hardware device that passively copies network traffic at a designated point in the network infrastructure, forwarding that copy to external monitoring or analysis tools without altering or interrupting the live traffic flow. The device is deployed "out of band," meaning monitoring is performed on a duplicate of traffic rather than inline, so any failure of the TAP or the attached monitoring device does not affect network operation or availability. Network TAPs are available in both passive and active variants. Passive TAPs require no power to pass traffic and fail open by design, while active TAPs can aggregate, filter, or regenerate traffic for delivery to downstream tools. Speeds up to 400Gb are supported. Typical deployment use cases include: - General network monitoring (latency, saturation) - Intrusion detection and security monitoring - Data gathering and traffic analysis - Feed traffic to packet brokers or other aggregation devices The product line includes several hardware models: - 3808E and 3299: Multi-purpose hybrid bypass switches - 3296: Passive bypass switch - 3225: Modular passive TAP supporting any rate Network TAPs are designed to complement other visibility infrastructure components such as Network Packet Brokers (NPBs), which aggregate and filter TAP feeds before delivering traffic to security and monitoring tools. The devices are designed and manufactured in Silicon Valley, USA.