Remote access and the resultant mobile workforce have emerged as a critical business-enabler, as it allows organisations to stay competitive irrespective of the location, allowing for access to important company information when and where needed.
However, with remote access also come a myriad security issues. To simplify the process and overcome some of these challenges, Nology has released Billion's VPN Security Appliance, the Billion BiGuard S20 to South African organisations.
Aimed at small to medium enterprises (SMEs), the security appliance integrates both SSL and IPSec (IP security) complementary remote access solutions. The S20, therefore, offers both IPSec and SSL VPN capabilities on a single platform, thus providing the most advanced security options for remote users available today.
In turn, this combination provides excellent deployment flexibility to smaller business operations for meeting the requirements of any remote access users. The need for - and additional cost of - deploying separate, hardware platforms for both SSL and IPSec VPN is also mitigated.
"In addition to advanced remote access and security features, the S20 appliance also allows for automatic failover, as it can accommodate two broadband lines/types, which in turn, provides network redundancy should one connection fail. This feature also optimises bandwidth among multiple users," comments Pierre Holthausen, channel manager at Nology, a supplier of broadband and networking solutions.
The S20 supports a wide range of browsers, platforms and operating systems (OS), providing remote users, mobile workers and external business partners with remote access to the corporate network to share files, check e-mail, and download documents.
Furthermore, a mobile user can log-in via devices like a PDA, while Macintosh users can connect an Apple PC remotely to gain access to corporate networks, whether it is to collaborate or to access information for fast project turnaround.
The S20 security appliance supports both IPSec and SSL encryption and authentication to ensure data transmission security and user authorisation.
The device includes firewall, stateful packet inspection (SPI), denial of service (DOS) prevention and URL filtering technology, providing protection against malicious attacks. The firewall also features an e-mail alert service, activated whenever an attack occurs.
Additionally, the VPN appliance offers support for Billion's One-Time Password (OTP), a chip-based, six-digit numeric PIN token to be used in combination with a password for a strong two-factor authentication.
Essentially, it provides single password authentication for remote VPN access through the use of an ASAS back-end server. Each OTP token is unique and is assigned an electronic serial number (ESN) and identification seed, which means the authentication cannot be reproduced.
This is the ideal security solution for SMEs, providing them with peace of mind to communicate and transact over the corporate network and Internet.
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