With SASE, networking and security solutions and technologies come together in a single cloud-delivered service model. This simplifies security, improves performance, and helps IT reduce costs.
It eliminates the need for disparate point solutions like SD-WAN, SWG, and NGFW. This reduces complexity and saves on hardware, licensing, deployment, and maintenance costs.
Meaning
Imagine a fortress without walls: Traditional security guards every entry point, but modern threats sneak in through unguarded windows. SASE meaning security redefines the perimeter. It secures access to applications and data wherever they live, protecting your organization from today’s borderless cyber threats.
The SASE architecture is a cloud-based network model that combines networking and security capabilities. It brings networking closer to the edge, eliminates the need for VPNs, and limits latency. It also enables Zero Trust Network Access (ZTNA), which authenticates users and devices before granting access to applications.
The architecture is well-suited to today’s digital landscape, where networks are growing more distributed and complex, and employees need secure access to cloud applications. The SASE architecture helps businesses adapt to these changes and protect their networks from increasingly sophisticated cyberattacks.
Choosing the right SASE solution is critical. The SASE market is still emerging, and many vendors are approaching it from different backgrounds and specialties. For example, some have prioritized their cloud and SD-WAN capabilities, while others have focused on building their security offerings. This makes finding a single solution that offers everything you need is challenging.
A cross-functional team is essential to help identify and prioritize your needs for the best results. The team should include security, networking, and business representatives to create a strategy and adoption timeline that meets your organization’s needs. In addition, you need to discover and assess your existing infrastructure and staffing resources to determine what can stay in place and what additional solutions may be needed for the edge.
Purpose
SASE combines network and security functions into a single platform that provides simpler management, reduced costs, improved performance, and more excellent protection. It enables enterprises to adopt Zero Trust Network Access (ZTNA) measures without the added latency of backhauling traffic to the data center for inspection. It also enables granular visibility and control of users and devices accessing applications at the edge.
The first step in deploying SASE is an honest assessment of your infrastructure, business requirements, and the current state of your security infrastructure. This will help you determine whether your existing solutions are ready for SASE and if anything must be changed, purchased, or implemented to enable it.
Ideally, your choice of SASE will allow you to deploy at multiple sites with minimal upfront cost. Choose a solution that can support your network architecture and remote locations, including any on-premise or cloud systems. It should also have a global SD-WAN footprint with distributed points of presence (PoPs) to reduce network latency and support work-from-anywhere agility.
Ensure your chosen SASE solution combines networking and security capabilities into a single, integrated architecture. This approach streamlines management and eliminates blind spots created by siloed tools, enabling faster response to threats based on stolen credentials and weaponized APIs. Look for a solution that offers a converged cloud-native software stack, not discrete networking and security devices service chained together. This approach will deliver better security, performance, and scalability.
Benefits
As more organizations embrace work-from-anywhere environments and the need for secure network access grows, SASE becomes more critical. This helps ensure scalability, agility, and security while improving performance and user experience.
SASE can reduce complexity for both networking and security teams when implemented effectively. Unifying network and security functions into a single solution eliminates the need for multiple physical appliances and tools from different vendors. This simplifies deployment and management and reduces the time needed to configure each device. This helps reduce costs and frees up internal resources to focus on more pressing business matters.
It can also increase efficiency and agility by accelerating performance with direct-to-cloud connections that bypass backhauling traffic to data centers for inspection. It can also provide a more straightforward user experience by eliminating the need for VPNs and instead leveraging zero trust network access (ZTNA) that authenticates users and devices based on their identity.
Lastly, SASE can help to reduce risk with centralized role-based access control (RBAC). This model allows organizations to restrict access based on specific user roles that define what they can do and what they cannot. This can strengthen security and improve productivity by ensuring that only the right people use the proper devices to access sensitive information.
Conclusions
The SASE architecture is a powerful way to provide network security for remote workers, and the solution can be scalable to meet enterprise needs. However, assessing an enterprise’s current IT environment and user base is essential before moving to a SASE system. Enterprises should also consider Capex and Opex costs, UX, speed and agility, operational efficiency, and scalability when assessing return on investment (ROI).
When choosing a SASE service provider, looking for certifications and testimonials is essential. Additionally, look for a platform to integrate various security services into one solution. This can help you better secure your business and prevent data breaches.
SASE can protect a network from threats in the cloud, public networks, and even endpoint devices. It adopts a zero-trust security model, requiring strict user and device identity verification. This approach helps ensure the protection of critical IP and complies with regulatory requirements.
The centralized control offered by SASE solutions can help CISOs and other network security leaders see the entire network at a glance, making it easier to identify threats. It can also reduce overall network latency. Additionally, SASE systems can resist denial of service attacks more than traditional data centers. This makes them an excellent choice for networks with remote employees.
