Fundamentally, this component is responsible for the following:

- Sets up redirection with newly-started (or newly-added, previously-started) application pods such that traffic from application pods is forwarded to the local node's ztunnel pod.
- Configures required iptables, sockets, and packet routing miscellanea within the `ztunnel` and application pod network namespaces to make that happen.

This component accomplishes that in the following ways:

- [HorizontalPodAutoscaler](https://kubernetes.io/docs/tasks/run-application/horizontal-pod-autoscale/)
- [PodDisruptionBudget](https://kubernetes.io/docs/concepts/workloads/pods/disruptions/#how-disruption-budgets-work)
- [pod annotations](https://kubernetes.io/docs/concepts/overview/working-with-objects/annotations/)
- [container environment variables](https://kubernetes.io/docs/tasks/inject-data-application/define-environment-variable-container/)

   policy enforcement and telemetry recording/reporting
   functions.

  > Note: The service mesh is not an overlay network. It
  > simplifies and enhances how microservices in an application talk to each
  > other over the network provided by the underlying platform.