Redefining Security at the Mobile Edge
The decentralized organization
During the pandemic, organizations became more geographically dispersed, even if that only means people working from home instead of the office. As businesses begin to open up again, the trend is leaning toward mobility as a means to support a hybrid working environment, in which employees have more flexibility to work wherever it suits them best. The remote user, who was once the exception, has become the norm.
In addition to the employee, software is also migrating outside the corporate perimeter. The increased adoption of cloud applications, storage, and computing resources is putting pressure on the traditional networking and security models. Legacy networks that were designed and built for a centralized world where all devices, traffic, and resources were inside the same physical network cannot cope with the performance and security requirements of cloud-based businesses.
SD-WAN as an Enterprise Enabler
As cloud computing is becoming the norm, CIOs have realized that traditional wide area network (WAN) architectures cannot handle the ever-rising demands that are putting networks under pressure, especially when it comes to mobile and IoT use cases.
Software-defined WAN (SD-WAN) architectures have emerged as a viable solution to the networking problem. They are capable of delivering high levels of application performance with traffic management features and security capabilities to protect the business. SD-WAN is capable of connecting users to cloud-based applications and resources efficiently and securely while keeping costs down. By shifting to an SD-WAN architecture, the network becomes an enabler for the business. More importantly, employees in remote locations gain access to a rich environment where they can be more efficient and productive.
Securing the Mobile Edge
Although cellular connectivity was initially considered a backup to MPLS and broadband WAN, nowadays 4G LTE is an active member of the transport mix for SD-WAN, connecting users to critical business applications. As 5G comes out of its infancy and operators worldwide speed up the rollout of the service, we will see a greater number of mobile-first organizations incentivized by the high data rates and ultra-reliable, low-latency performance.
The convergence of SD-WAN and mobile connectivity brings some challenges to CIOs, especially for enterprises that have invested heavily in fixed-line infrastructure to secure site-to-site access. In these instances, secure mobile access is not fully integrated into the architecture and is delivered through cumbersome VPN connections that are costly and do not scale well.
Unified Endpoint Security
The industry needs to consider including mobility and IoT in a single holistic digital transformation program, with nondivergent central network orchestration. What CIOs need is a more sophisticated zero-footprint option that makes the endpoints behave as if they are seamlessly integrated within the enterprise private network (be it SD-WAN, ZTNA, CASB, or SASE) service, without relying on a client being deployed on the mobile handset.
Akamai provides a solution that offers an on-demand mobile private network slice per enterprise that is clientless for remote users and IoT devices. Private Access Edge makes IoT and mobile endpoints behave as if they are within the enterprise private network, meaning CIOs can make the most of existing investments in next-generation cloud-based firewalls.
Learn more about Akamai Private Access Edge.
