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SASE stands for Secure Access Service Edge. It is a comprehensive solution that combines network security and connectivity in a unified cloud-native architecture. SASE removes the legacy part of network security and shifts to a more dynamic, modern, and flexible security system.

In this article, I explain why businesses should migrate from traditional firewalling to SASE. Find out why SASE, in my view, is the future of network security.

Cloud-Centric Architecture:

SASE represents a paradigm shift from hardware-centric traditional firewalling based on what “tin” in your network to cloud-centric security. Unlike traditional firewalling, which relies on on-premises appliances. This networking system delivers security services directly to users, regardless of location. Whether in the office, at home, or at the local Starbucks, the cloud-native approach ensures scalability, agility, and global reach. This allows organisations to adapt seamlessly to evolving threats and business requirements.

Zero Trust Security Model And SASE:

SASE embraces the zero-trust security model, which assumes that no entity, inside or outside the network, should be trusted by default. Authentication/ authorisation of users and devices grants access to applications and resources. In this way, SASE minimises the risk of unauthorised access and lateral movement within the network. This granular approach to security enhances protection against insider threats and external cyberattacks, bolstering overall defence posture. Now, don’t be fooled into thinking that all Zero Trust is SASE! Many vendors use “Zero Trust” to define their SD-WAN or legacy products to compete with SASE products.

Converged Security Services:

One of the key advantages of SASE is its ability to converge multiple security functions into a single platform. Unlike traditional firewalling, SASE integrates these functionalities into a unified architecture. Historically, the system required deploying disparate security solutions such as VPNs, firewalls, secure web gateways, and intrusion detection systems.

This consolidation streamlines management, reduces complexity, and lowers operational costs, enabling organisations to achieve greater efficiency without compromising security.

Additional benefits of adopting SASE include:

Optimised Performance and User Experience: SASE leverages a distributed architecture with points of presence (PoPs) strategically located around the globe. By routing traffic through the nearest PoP, SASE minimises latency, optimises performance and enhances the user experience. Additionally, SASE employs advanced traffic steering and optimisation techniques to prioritise critical applications to ensure consistent performance across diverse network environments.

Dynamic Policy Enforcement: Traditional firewalling relies on static rule-based policies that are often prone to misconfigurations. SASE adopts a dynamic policy enforcement approach based on contextual factors such as user identity, device posture, location, and application sensitivity. This contextual awareness enables adaptive access controls that dynamically adjust security policies in real time. This gives organisations greater flexibility and responsiveness to evolving threats or business needs.

Comprehensive Threat Protection: SASE combines essential security services such as firewalling, secure web gateways, intrusion prevention, data loss prevention, and malware detection into a unified platform. By integrating these capabilities with advanced threat intelligence and machine learning-driven analytics, the business gains a greater ability to operate in the safest environment. Lastly, SASE delivers multi-layered protection against a wide range of cyber threats, including malware, ransomware, phishing, and zero-day exploits.

In conclusion, SASE represents a quantum leap forward in network security, offering a transformative approach that addresses the challenges of the modern digital age. By embracing cloud-native architecture, zero-trust security principles, converged security services, optimised performance, dynamic policy enforcement, scalability and comprehensive threat protection, organisations can future-proof their networks and empower their workforce to thrive in an increasingly interconnected world.

If you want to talk to one of our experts about how we can help your business secure itself using SASE, please call 01235 433900 or email [email protected]. If you want to speak to me directly, you can contact me via DM or at [email protected].

Did you enjoy this article? Why not read another of James’ blogs…
The True Cost Of Migrating On-Premise Infrastructure To The Cloud

While the world continues to turn day to day life upside down and “normal” is more of a relative word than ever before, I wanted to take this opportunity at the start of the year to look at the technology trends your business should be looking into and adopting in order to ensure that whatever the global or national situation, your business is safe secure and up to date.

Cloud Services

If 2020 didn’t already do this for your business you should be looking at moving services to the cloud, now this is bigger than just moving your email to Office 365 or G Suite. When we talk about cloud services in 2021 this is about moving as much of the infrastructure, it’s management and the associated risks away from your physical business location.

If we take a traditional office where you have your servers, storage, back-ups and user data onsite close to where your users where working, in 2021 this approach is illogical with staff working from home and in the office suddenly you have a single point of failure in your office environment as well as needing the equipment maintained , monitored and managed in a location which may be shut due to local restrictions.

With the move to Cloud services the aim is to push as many of these services to diverse, secure and robust providers which removes the inherent risks and reduces any downtime you might face. If done in the right way you can do this with the same level of latency that you would get in your office environment but accessible quickly for your users working from home.

With businesses that implemented cloud services in 2020, they saw an decrease in running costs of up to 50% and an increase in uptime and productivity up to 99.99% which is beyond what any onsite system can deliver and this is due to the scale and depth of the product line of some of the cloud services on the market.

work from home

The Human Firewall

The trends we saw in 2020 made it very clear that we need to invest as much time into training our staff to be safe and secure as we do into finding the right technology to support them. That is why in 2021 one of the key areas of development we believe all business should be looking at is the human firewall. By this we mean training your staff to know what is safe and is not safe in the digital world and how to prevent risks to the business.

We saw the effect that phishing can have on business with an increase of 667% in March last year when COVID first became a major issue for the U.K. and scammers took in their waves to try and use peoples vulnerabilities against the businesses they work for. These attacks continue today following trends of presenting vaccination options and emails about furlough schemes all designed to capture business information and defraud businesses.

Now with this there is no one size fits all approach but there is a logical approach which will prevent your business being open to risks that exist on your doorstep. If we can teach our staff in 2021 to stop, deal with and report these problems then we increase the ability of a business to be robust and secure and remove the guess work from the technology we need to ensure a business is safe, for me 2021 is the year of the Human Firewall.

human firewall

Zero Trust Networking

As we move to a more dynamic way of working, both now and post COVID, we need to think about how the new fleet of devices we operate as businesses are managed, controlled and protected. The physical borders of your office space are no longer 4 brick walls but unlimited by the connectivity we have in place. Because of this we need to look at how we secure and control our devices, users and data across such a wide spectrum of use cases.

Now this can start with the simple steps of Mobile Device Management, Cloud based anti-virus technology but very quickly we need to be thinking about virtual connections to datacentres, home broadband and wireless security and cloud access control.

This is why in 2021 I believe all businesses need to review their approach and look to embed a zero-trust approach into all aspects, and while some people will see this approach as intrusive and over the top, it has been proven time and time again to not be. You only have to look at the speed in which a home wireless network can be broken into to realise that you are not safe trusting peoples home set ups.

In conclusion 2021, like 2020, is going to be a very different year, with the cyber criminals and the threat landscape changing everyday. However as business owners, technical professionals or employees we need to switch our approach and ensure we are using these changes to make our business ready for this continually changing landscape as we move forward.

If you want to talk to one of our experts about how we can help you in 2021 then please call 01235 433900 or you can email [email protected] or if you would like to speak to me directly you can reach out to me via DM or at [email protected].

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