One of the most common types of network security systems is what’s known as perimeter-based defenses. This is the philosophy of securing a network by focusing on making sure that the inside of the network is safeguarded from whatever threat actors there may be on the outside. It’s a bit like defending a bank vault by spending all of your money on finding ways to stop thieves from breaking in. That’s a great idea — until it isn’t. If thieves manage to breach the perimeter, crack the vault, or whatever other analogy you choose to use, you’re powerless to do anything about it.
How COVID Has Changed Working
This problem has become more pronounced in recent times, especially during the COVID pandemic, as more distributed teams and increased reliance on the cloud for carrying out remote work have seen more and more traffic moved outside the corporate local area network (LAN). These changes are unlikely to be limited to COVID times either. Going forward it seems guaranteed that employees will ask for, and companies will be keen to offer, a hybrid blend of working in a physical office and also allowing for remote working.
In this arrangement, users and organizations want to be able to access the tools they need quickly, easily, and from anywhere. One technology that can help with this is an SD WAN solution. Standing for a “software-defined wide-area network,” SD WAN employs a virtualized network overlay that’s abstracted from the hardware. As more and more enterprise organizations migrate to the cloud, SD WAN can help build and manage the necessary network security that’s able to connect offices that may be geographically dispersed.
The Network Security Challenge
A big part of the shift that’s taking place involves network security. Along with high performance, organizations must also be able to provide high-security access as this migration to the cloud takes place, shifting away from data centers to the network edge.
Network security can be a tough problem to solve. One protective measure that some may opt to take involves backhauling traffic to the data center so that traffic can be inspected and secured. This meets the security concern part of the puzzle, but it also, unfortunately, adds cost and delays, impairing the performance of applications and resulting in an impaired user experience.
Standalone solutions increase security teams’ overload. Particularly when it comes to using multiple, possibly disjointed tools from multiple vendors, the results can be too many alerts, too many consoles, and too many tools to manage. That’s not good for anyone. Security consolidation is a crucial part of sustainability. A consolidated security stack decreases analysts’ workload and means fewer tools to manage, monitor, and maintain. That, in turn, means being able to focus on managing risk and responding to threats.
Security Has To Be In The Right Place To Be Effective
As enterprises become more distributed, security needs to as well too. This is where SASE (pronounced “sassy”) enters the picture. Short for Secure Access Service Edge, this next-gen network architecture blends network security functionality with WAN capabilities to be able to support the requirements for dynamic secure access demanded by organizations.
It’s a combination of cloud-native architecture, global SD-WAN architecture, and assorted security features such as secure web gateway (SWG), firewall as a service (FWaaS), zero-trust network access (ZTNA), and more. It allows for scalable, consistent security that consolidates and simplifies security without impairing performance in the process.
By combining SD-WAN and other network infrastructure into one single, cloud-based platform, organizations can simplify network complexity and management. It makes it easier to securely gain access to a network remotely and, where necessary, to stop cyberattacks. With SASE, it’s possible for both users and devices to gain secure access to the resources they need, and to authenticate, using security that’s located near to them. They can also do this in a manner that has minimal latency issues. In short, it’s a global fabric that both secures and connects every element of the enterprise — including mobile users, sites, cloud resources, and Internet of Things (IoT) devices.
Ultimately, it’s the answer when it comes to achieving consistent security policy enforcement in a changing world built around the cloud. What more are you looking for?
