Network Address Translation (NAT)

Network Address Translation (NAT) was developed because of the explosive growth of the Internet and the increase in home and business networks—the number of available IP addresses was simply not enough. A computer must have an IP address in order to communicate with other computers on the Internet. NAT allows a single device, such as a router, to act as an agent between the Internet and the local network. This device or router provides a pool of addresses to be used by your local network. Only a single, unique IP address is required to represent this entire group of computers.