The Definitive Guide to SASE

What is SASE, and why it is such a hot technology? More importantly, why do we need SASE as the future of the next-generation service delivery model? Before I answer the “what,” let’s look at the “why.”

Business Needs Drive Technology Innovation

Two recent global events demonstrated the need for a new service delivery model that must be agile and deployable worldwide without delay. The first event was the 2008 global recession, which forced many businesses to downsize and was followed by a streak of robust growth lasting well over ten years. The second was the global shutdown caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. This unprecedented event caused a sharp decline in global businesses — many were shuttered permanently, especially those relying on brick-and-mortar locations.

The global shutdown has spurred an explosion in technology innovations. Businesses that embrace virtual collaboration by allowing employees to work from anywhere found new opportunities and have been thriving.

Not surprisingly, a recent survey from PwC (PricewaterhouseCoopers) shows that this virtual collaboration model is here to stay, as both employers and employees are seeing a tremendous boost in productivity.

Requirements for Next-Generation Security and Network Services

As constrained budgets and staffing resources increasingly fail to keep up, the need to shift away from conventional security becomes more acute. This gap is unbridgeable with conventional security approaches.

The rapid, accordion-like boom-and-bust cycles of the last two decades deliver a clear message: There is a need to complement the current on-premises service delivery model with an agile cloud model that takes minutes to deploy and is easy to scale.

Work-from-anywhere, BYOD and mobile technologies have radically changed user behavior. Most organizations still have a perimeter that needs to be secured, but they also have many assets outside that perimeter that need to be protected, no matter where they are. These factors give rise to the requirements for the next generation of network and security, the SASE delivery model, shown below:

What is SASE?

Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) enables a holistic approach that brings security and network technologies together in a cloud-delivered, secure, network-as-a-service (NaaS) solution. With SASE, security and network services are easy to manage, easy to use and quick to deploy.

Such a delivery model empowers organizations to break free from the untenable economic, technical and staffing constraints of conventional approaches — all with less cost and human intervention than conventional security.

ZTNA and NaaS are usually the starting points for a journey toward a complete SASE solution. With SASE, you will have a choice to add FW, SWG, CASB and SD-WAN as one tightly integrated solution.

Still skeptical? Here’s an example of scale and agility from SonicWall’s first SASE product — the Cloud Edge Secure Access.

Through Zero-Trust Network Access (ZTNA) and NaaS, Cloud Edge Secure Access can onboard a branch site, individual users and business partners in minutes. At the same, it provides top-notch privacy for every user, regardless of location. It secures high-value assets in the cloud through its inherent support for least-privilege access security.

With least-privilege security, users and devices can access only what’s necessary and nothing more, similar to the concept of a “need-to-know basis.” By limiting the exposure to other sensitive areas of the network, an organization can secure its resources without sacrificing their operational flexibility.

Since these services can be delivered securely over commodity internet, a business can be completely independent of predetermined locations. At the same time, it can still enjoy the benefits of the most advanced security and networking services as one tightly integrated solution. How’s that for cost savings and ultimate freedom of choice?

Want to Know More?

If you’re interested in knowing more about SASE, read the Definitive Guide to SASE shown below on the slide, or simply scan the QR code provided. This e-book is meant for anyone with a role in security or networking, whether an administrator, manager or executive looking for a solution to regain control of this new upside-down environment — one in which most employees are outside the traditional perimeter-based firewall.

SonicWall Staff