Secure and Simplify SD-Branch Networks

Today’s branch office networks are being asked to deliver more and beyond what they are capable of. Digital transformation initiatives, SaaS adoption, and the rapid growth of IoT devices have strained branch office networking infrastructure while expanding the attack surface. It’s not easy for a branch network to keep up with performance demands while securing everything connected. As a result, fast-growing branch networks tend to lack visibility and centralized management, leaving security gaps, inconsistent policy, and misconfiguration risks.

IoT’s Unique Challenges

Numerous IoT devices, particularly connected office appliances and employee-owned smart devices join the network, often without security and unreliable visibility. These devices typically lack built-in security, and they are headless and not easy to patch. To make things more difficult, many IoT devices are added to the network without the knowledge of IT or security teams, posing a significant challenge to branch security. Unfortunately, branch solutions are typically not integrated and lack the key capabilities needed to address the lack of security and visibility that IoT devices present. Without comprehensive and centralized IoT device visibility, branches and by extension, the broader organization are vulnerable to attacks.

Fast-growing branch networks tend to lack visibility and centralized management, leaving security gaps, inconsistent policy, and misconfiguration risks.

Non-integrated branch architectures cannot also share threat information in real-time and adapt defences to multiple points of attack in unison. This prevents organizations from defending themselves against a coordinated attack across multiple devices or parts of the distributed organization, such as IoT-targeting botnets. IoT devices with known vulnerabilities need to be automatically and immediately secured to protect the organization. A solution that can enforce zero trust for IoT, which includes intelligence sharing and coordinated response is needed to secure the branch network.

SD-WAN Needs to Be Secure

Another branch challenge is that the demand for networking infrastructures has exceeded the capacity of outdated WAN technologies. The traditional WAN relies on expensive MPLS connectivity and a hub-and-spoke architecture that backhauls all traffic through the corporate data centre for centralized security checks. This approach creates bottlenecks that interfere with network performance and reliability. In addition to users demanding fast and reliable access to resources, IoT applications need reliable WAN connections to leverage cloud-based management and big data repositories.

Software-defined wide area networking (SD-WAN) is rapidly replacing traditional WAN in branch deployments. While SD-WAN offers performance benefits that support digital transformation and IoT, many SD-WAN solutions lack consolidated networking and security features. In response, network teams have added an assortment of tools and solutions to manage and protect their SD-WAN deployments, resulting in complex branch infrastructures without centralized management and visibility.

A secure SD-WAN solution can eliminate the complexity of disaggregated point solutions in a branch infrastructure. This not only reduces the organization’s attack surface while enabling digital innovation initiatives, but it also simplifies operations for networking teams.

Convergence Solves Branch Challenges

To reduce complexity and appliance sprawl, SD-Branch consolidates networking and security capabilities into a single solution that provides seamless protection of distributed environments. It covers all critical branch edges, from the WAN edge to the branch access layer to a full spectrum of endpoint devices. It extends secure SD-WAN capabilities across wired and wireless networks while simplifying branch infrastructure management. What’s more, it delivers unparalleled performance and reliability while providing centralized control and visibility across the entire branch attack surface.

By integrating a next-generation firewall with SD-WAN, access points (APs), switches, NAC, and LTE/5G gateways, SD-Branch solution simplifies branch architecture and enables global enforcement of policies at all WAN edges, the branch access layer, and endpoint devices. It unifies WAN and LAN environments and extends security and network performance to the access layer. It automates the discovery, classification, and protection of IoT devices when they seek network access and includes virtual patching, which enables compensating controls until a full firmware update can be applied. It also automatically provides anomaly detection and remediation processes based on defined business logic. To add more a distributed organization can rapidly scale operations across new offices and geographic locations.

SD-Branch also helps to reduce the need for on-site resources, which lowers TCO. Single-pane-of-glass management capabilities combine security and network layer visibility to optimize staff efficiency while enabling proactive risk management. Zero-touch deployment features reduce the burdens associated with initial setup and business growth over time.

As branch networks continue to adopt SD-WAN and expand their application use to cloud-based tools, there is a desire to consolidate branch network components to avoid an explosion of complexity. To solve branch challenges, organizations need solutions that converge their network security, WAN, LAN, and advanced NAC technologies to ensure enhanced experience while maintaining security. By doing all this, SD-Branch consolidates the network access layer within a secure platform that provides visibility and security to the network and all devices that connect to it.

By Vivek Srivastava

Vivek Srivastava is Country Manager, India & SAARC at Fortinet.

maildqindia@cybermedia.co.in