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Tag: SASE

  • Is SASE the DevSecOps of Infrastructure Management?

    Is SASE the DevSecOps of Infrastructure Management?

    DevOps gained traction when IT and Ops (operations) teams recognized that traditional silos and handoffs were leading to inefficiencies and delays in software delivery. While DevOps enabled seamless collaboration and delivered on its promise of speed and efficiency, security remained an afterthought. To overcome the security loophole, DevSecOps emerged, proposing a shift-left approach to security. It emphasizes conducting tasks like security scanning, vulnerability assessment, and compliance checks all throughout the CI/CD pipeline.

    With DevSecOps, speed no longer comes at the cost of security.

    The DevSecOps approach has helped organizations strike the right balance between security and agility in software development. As the infrastructure landscape continues to evolve with the rise of cloud and edge computing, resource-intensive AI and ML initiatives, and distributed workforces, organizations must establish a similar balance between security and ubiquitous connectivity. This is where secure access service edge (SASE) comes in.

    SASE’s Philosophy is Similar to DevSecOps

    As legacy networks — characterized by rigid hardware-based infrastructure — struggled to keep pace with the demands of modern business, SD-WAN emerged as a solution, providing flexibility, centralized management and dynamic traffic routing. However, when distributed computing and remote work virtually dissolved the corporate perimeter, perimeter-focused security tools were no longer sufficient either. Today, enterprises must extend their security capabilities to almost unlimited network access points.

    SASE addresses this challenge by merging networking and security into a single cloud-native framework. It integrates the entire security stack across all edge locations, ensuring secure connectivity between users, applications and resources no matter where they are. Just as DevSecOps shifts security to the left, making it an inherent part of the entire SDLC (software development lifecycle), SASE shifts security to the network edge, making it an inherent part of network connectivity.

    The strategic resemblance between the philosophy behind SASE and DevSecOps is uncanny.

    1. Breaking Silos

    DevSecOps breaks down the silos between DevOps and security teams, promoting collaboration and shared responsibility. In a similar vein, SASE unifies all network and security functions into a single architecture, effectively dismantling the conventional boundaries between the networking and security teams. It allows both teams to jointly manage, monitor, and secure the infrastructure and network traffic through a unified management dashboard. SASE also effectively breaks the data silos that leave security teams with no insights regarding the networking conditions. SASE’s single pane of glass visibility enables networking and security data correlation, broadening each team’s perspective and eliminating tunnel vision for accurate and robust threat detection and an enhanced security posture.

    2. Embracing the Cloud

    DevSecOps aligns perfectly with cloud-native technologies like infrastructure as code (IaC) and containerization technologies like Docker, making it imperative for cloud-first and cloud-ready organizations. On the other hand, SASE is inherently cloud-native. It delivers network and security services from the cloud, providing organizations with the agility and scalability needed to meet the dynamic demands of a distributed environment.

    Traditional back-haul-based connectivity and perimeter-based security solutions introduce latency and coverage gaps. SASE performs network and security functions at the edge, closest to wherever resources and users are. This eliminates the need for disparate on-premises point solutions and extends corporate security perimeter to match the cloud’s global reach.

    3. Agility Through Automation

    DevSecOps emphasizes automation of security tasks, such as security checks, scans and compliance assessments, within its continuous integration and continuous delivery (CI/CD) pipelines. SASE also leverages automation for networking and security tasks, such as dynamic policy enforcement, AI-driven threat detection and response, and network optimization through dynamic routing and self-healing properties. Automation reduces the need for manual intervention, bolsters security, simplifies operational tasks and enables organizations to respond to evolving demands and circumstances faster, crucial for agile environments.

    SASE as an Enabler for DevSecOps

    Just as DevSecOps enhances security within the context of application development, SASE enhances security and efficiency within the realm of networking and infrastructure management. Both approaches share the common goals of integrating security, promoting automation and ensuring scalability. They may apply these principles to different aspects of IT and cybersecurity, but DevSecOps and SASE can work together seamlessly to support modern IT environments.

    Many organizations adopting DevSecOps realize that they lack the necessary infrastructure to support this approach effectively. DevSecOps demands seamless global collaboration and the integration of security controls across the entire IT environment. This is something SASE can help with. It can simplify infrastructure management and enhance security for DevSecOps in several ways. It offers ubiquitous connectivity for seamless collaboration, provides built-in security measures for faster incident response and ensures reliable infrastructure. As such, these are all crucial aspects for achieving the ultimate DevSecOps goal of delivering secure and high-performance applications at speed. With SASE, organizations can set their DevSecOps up for success.

  • SASE Continues to Roll with Revenue up 34 Percent to Top $6 Billion in 2022, According to Dell’Oro Group

    Cisco Remains Overall SASE Leader But Zscaler Close Behind

    Redwood City, CA, March 22, 2023 – According to a recently published report from Dell’Oro Group, the trusted source for market information about the telecommunications, security, networks, and data center industries, the worldwide SASE market topped $6 B in 2022, representing robust 34 percent growth year-over-year (Y/Y). In a crowded market with over 30 vendors, Cisco remained the overall SASE leader with a 17 percent revenue share, but second place Zscaler was less than 1 percent behind and closing in compared to 2021.

    “For the third consecutive year, SASE revenue growth topped 30 percent as the pandemic-fueled need to modernize the network and security architecture for branch offices and hybrid users continued,” said Mauricio Sanchez, Research Director, Network Security, and SASE & SD-WAN at Dell’Oro Group. “Single-vendor SASE solutions grew faster as a reflection of greater enterprise preference for one-stop-shop versus multi-vendor best-of-breed,” added Sanchez.

    Additional highlights from the 4Q 2022 SASE & SD-WAN Quarterly Report for full-year 2022:

    • The top 3 overall SASE vendors by revenue were Cisco, Zscaler, and Broadcom/Symantec, and together they represented just over 40 percent of the market.
    • The networking portion of SASE (SD-WAN) saw revenue climb 30 percent Y/Y as enterprise shift from access routing to SD-WAN solutions increased and supply chains for hardware substantially improved.
    • The top 3 SD-WAN vendors by revenue were Cisco, Fortinet, and VMware, and together they represented nearly half of the market.
    • The security portion of SASE (SSE – Security Service Edge) experienced 38 percent growth Y/Y as a result of enterprises’ embrace of cloud-delivered network security to secure cloud-based applications and user’s access to those applications.
    • On a technology basis, SSEs represented nearly 60 percent of the SASE market by revenue. The remainder, 40 percent, was SD-WAN.
    • Single-vendor SASE was 45 percent of the overall SASE market.
    • The top 3 single-vendor SASE vendors by revenue were Cisco, Fortinet, and Palo Alto Networks.
    • Disaggregated SASE revenue was much greater than unified SASE, but the growth rate for unified was far higher.
    • The top 3 unified SASE vendors by revenue were Versa Networks, VMware, and Cato Networks.

    About the Report

    The Dell’Oro Group SASE & SD-WAN report includes manufacturers’ revenue covering the SASE and Access Router markets. In addition, the report analyzes the SASE market from two perspectives, technology (SD-WAN networking and SSE security) and implementation (unified and disaggregated). The report also provides unit information for the Access Router market. To purchase this report, please contact us at dgsales@delloro.com.

    About Dell’Oro Group

    Dell’Oro Group is a market research firm that specializes in strategic competitive analysis in the telecommunications, security, enterprise network, and data center infrastructure markets. Our firm provides in-depth quantitative data and qualitative analysis to facilitate critical, fact-based business decisions. For more information, contact Dell’Oro Group at +1.650.622.9400 or visit www.delloro.com.

  • How SASE Can Ease DevSecOps Adoption

    How SASE Can Ease DevSecOps Adoption

    DevSecOps is a software development methodology that merges development (Dev), security (Sec) and operations (Ops) into one team that integrates security throughout the entire software development life cycle (SDLC). The goal is to deliver high-quality applications quickly and securely.

    The traditional software development life cycle introduces security in the late phases of the SDLC. However, this approach cannot protect against sophisticated cybersecurity attacks. Today’s cybersecurity landscape requires shorter, frequent iterations to quickly patch and fix security issues. DevSecOps integrates security into the continuous integration and continuous delivery (CI/CD) pipeline to ensure teams can address pressing security issues at DevOps speed. 

    Many organizations are enthusiastically adopting DevSecOps but, in the process, discover they don’t have the necessary infrastructure. DevSecOps requires smooth global collaboration between teams and requires that security controls are built into the IT environment. This is where SASE comes in.  

    What is Secure Access Service Edge (SASE)?

    Secure access service edge (SASE) is a network security model that provides network connectivity with security based on identity, real-time security context and corporate security policies. It is aligned with the zero-trust security paradigm, ensuring that connections are denied by default unless a verified identity has permission to access a specific application, service or edge location. 

    SASE unifies networking and security functions into one fully integrated service delivered in the cloud. SASE includes several technologies: software-defined wide area networking (SD-WAN), secure web gateway (SWG), cloud access security broker (CASB), next-generation firewall (NGFW) and zero-trust network access (ZTNA).

    A key benefit of SASE is enhanced network security. SASE services enhance network security with a granular approach to network protection, detecting and blocking network attacks such as distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks, man-in-the-middle (MitM) attacks, phishing, email spoofing and malware with deep security scans. 

    Additional benefits of SASE include: 

    • Lower cost compared to traditional networks because SASE includes fewer on-premises hardware components and features previously purchased from multiple vendors. 
    • Easier maintenance because it provides one pane of glass that allows IT teams to manage all applications and users wherever they are. 

    Components of SASE

    Cloud-access Security Broker (CASB)

    CASB acts as a bridge between users/devices and cloud applications. It allows organizations to apply security policies, two-factor authentication and single sign-on to all cloud applications, preventing unauthorized devices and individuals from accessing sensitive assets and denying access by default.

    Zero-Trust Network Access (ZTNA)

    ZTNA ensures that users or devices have explicit permission to access applications or resources. It is a critical component of a zero-trust security architecture, ensuring that internal, private applications are hidden from users who should not have access to them. It also enables secure remote access through layered authentication. ZTNA provides flexible security to meet modern security requirements.

    Software-Defined Wide-Area Networking (SD-WAN)

    SD-WAN is a connectivity architecture that separates network hardware from the physical control layer. It improves network performance by enhancing and simplifying WAN performance and management. SD-WAN supports modern, cloud-based applications and services while reducing connectivity costs. Combining SD-WAN with advanced security features provides a foundation for enterprises to transition to SASE.

    Secure Web Gateways (SWG)

    SWG protects online devices from malware infection, enforces corporate security policies and filters unwanted websites in user-initiated internet traffic. SWG provides URL filtering, application control, DLP, antivirus, sandboxing and SSL inspection. All these capabilities protect users from harmful websites and enforce security policies while ensuring full web access and promoting productivity.

    Firewall-as-a-Service (FWaaS)

    FWaaS is a firewall solution delivered as a cloud-based service. It provides hyperscale next-generation firewall (NGFW) features, including web filtering, advanced threat protection (ATP), intrusion prevention systems (IPS) and domain name system (DNS) security. By integrating FWaaS into the SASE platform, organizations can provide a wide range of cybersecurity capabilities at the edge.

    Centralized and Unified Management

    The modern SASE platform enables IT administrators to manage SD-WAN, SWG, CASB, FWaaS and ZTNA with centralized, unified management across networks and environments. This allows IT team members to focus on more pressing areas and improves the user experience for the organization’s mixed workforce.

    How SASE Will Impact DevSecOps and Security in Organizations

    SASE can help secure internal interactions and applications. As a result, the burden on DevSecOps teams is reduced. DevOps teams can use zero-trust network access (ZTNA) to further secure the applications running on SD-WAN. These technologies keep all interactions between endpoints and applications secure.

    The SASE model can also help protect mission-critical applications and sensitive data that cannot run on the public internet. To protect these assets, SASE obfuscates traffic, restricts access with a zero-trust architecture, and secures all network entry points with NGFW. It continuously evaluates application traffic for security threats.

    Facilitating Collaboration 

    DevOps teams are focused on time-to-market and are constantly working to accelerate the CI/CD pipeline. They need to collaborate remotely over a reliable and secure connection. DevOps teams are also working to reduce their reliance on network and security teams. The SASE model helps address these problems.

    SASE helps reduce collaboration issues by unifying WAN and network security. SASE solutions provide optimized performance and strong security, so DevOps teams don’t depend on infrastructure staff to provision resources. It gives teams full control over operations without compromising performance or security.

    Providing Built-In Security

    SASE offers the basic network security features required to secure a DevOps project. This allows teams to integrate different security mechanisms into their networking stack, with all security services sharing an integration context. This plugs the gaps in traditional security architecture often exploited by attackers and protects applications from threats.

    Improving Incident Response

    SASE can immediately block various attack vectors with security controls embedded in the network fabric, supporting the incident response team’s efforts. SASE increases visibility into behavioral anomalies and security incidents in a hybrid environment.

    Integrating SASE solutions into a security information and event management (SIEM) system allows incident responders to gain greater visibility into traffic anomalies and the automated security actions taken by the SASE tools. SASE features like NGFW, SWG, IPS and anti-malware might already contain or eliminate many incidents.

    Providing More Reliable Infrastructure 

    DevOps teams need fast, reliable application performance. SASE offers integrated load balancing and failover capabilities that can significantly improve the network’s overall performance. 

    The SASE architecture can connect all the edge devices, remote users, data centers and cloud resources to a secure, self-healing, fully optimized global network. If a circuit fails or the path becomes congested, the fabric can automatically switch to an alternate path.

    Conclusion

    In this article, I introduced DevSecOps and showed how SASE, a modern platform that provides fast network connectivity and security at the edge, can support its adoption. DevOps teams can use SASE security components to secure applications across on-premises data centers and clouds. SASE can encrypt and inspect traffic to protect it from threats, ensuring that workloads, users, and development systems are secure by default. 

    With SASE, DevSecOps teams have the infrastructure they need to secure the environment and can focus on integrating security tests and remediations into the development life cycle.

  • What SASE Means for DevOps Teams

    What SASE Means for DevOps Teams

    You have probably heard the acronym secure access service edge (SASE), and it’s hard to ignore its impact on the technology industry. SASE is a cool new way to implement networking in hybrid environments, and the most important thing about it is that it bakes security into the network fabric. In plain English—when you plug in, you are secure by default. 

    SASE will have a special impact on two fields near and dear to the hearts of DevOps teams:

    1. Cloud security—SASE has the potential to transform how we practice security in the multi-cloud, and unify it with security in the central data center.
    2. DevSecOps adoption—SASE can make DevSecOps easier to adopt and might become essential infrastructure for globally distributed DevSecOps teams.

    Let’s understand the anatomy of the SASE beast, and understand how it will affect DevOps in the years to come.

    What Is SASE?

    SASE is a cloud service that extends networking and security capabilities to support hybrid organizations’ dynamic, secure access needs. 

    SASE combines WAN capabilities with network and security functions, such as firewall-as-a-service (FWaaS), zero-trust network access (ZTNA), secure web gateway (SWG) and more.

    A SASE platform bundles multiple security capabilities, including SD-WAN and services like SWG, CASB, ZTNA, FaaS and SaaS. This multi-region, multitenant architecture supports a distributed and remote workforce. SASE uses inspection engines located at points of presence (PoPs) near the endpoints rather than in the data center. SASE clients send traffic to the nearest PoP. 

    The core characteristics of a SASE architecture are:

    • Global SD-WAN—A private SD-WAN backbone helps reduce latency by avoiding the public internet. 
    • Distributed architecture—SASE inspects traffic and enforces policies at the edge using multiple inspection engines. 
    • Cloud infrastructure—SASE delivers services via the cloud, so tenants don’t have to maintain hardware and other infrastructure resources. This approach is scalable and cost-effective.
    • Identity-based access—Access controls use identity markers like the user’s location and device. 

    SASE Adoption Drivers: Why Do Organizations Want It?

    Cost Reduction

    Using physical and virtual appliances from multiple vendors is highly cumbersome and costly. SASE enables organizations to replace this disparate model with a single, cloud-native solution. Organizations can use SASE to deliver more technologies and services via one provider instead of several. As a result, it eliminates the cost of miscellaneous network appliances and optimizes cloud costs, by reducing the resources and bandwidth needed to operate a cloud environment. 

    Edge-to-Edge Security

    SD-WAN is an integral component of SASE, providing features such as an active-active failover and WAN optimization that improve performance and increase network resilience. SASE solutions are based on the concept of security automation, with a fully managed network security stack that typically includes SWGs, next-generation firewalls (NGFW), next-generation network architecture and intrusion prevention systems (IPS). This model helps protect all edges, achieving better network visibility.

    Data Protection

    SASE provides a holistic data protection experience that automates multiple DLP processes, including data discovery and data classification of storage locations, data usage and data in transit. It employs various security measures, such as user and device authentication, to enable control over access to data and resources at all times. Additionally, SASE DLP seamlessly rolls out protection policies across the entire network.

    Impact: How SASE Will Transform the Cloud Security Stack

    The emergence of services like PaaS, SaaS and IaaS has encouraged organizations to allow remote work. The cloud supports distributed workforces and streamlines business processes, but it also exposes companies to network-based threats. Many organizations store sensitive data with third parties accessed online.

    The cloud security stack can easily become siloed, with team members unsure of their responsibilities and overlooking critical processes. A siloed stack is more labor-intensive and harder to track because the security team uses multiple security systems. It can also create alert fatigue, making it hard to identify threats. 

    While employees mostly work in the cloud, security efforts often focus on the data center. SASE shifts the focus to the cloud while ensuring seamless integration between security services.

    With SASE, a single provider delivers the entire security stack, ensuring it functions as a unit. For instance, an SWG uses threat intelligence data to block suspicious traffic, sending unidentified files to a sandbox for testing. The security team can manage the entire stack from one intuitive interface. 

    Most activities occur at the edge—SASE secures the edge using an identity-driven approach. It is also cloud-native, ensuring a seamless experience. 

    Impact: How SASE Will Promote DevSecOps Adoption

    SASE provides the following advantages for adopting DevSecOps.

    Facilitating Collaboration 

    SASE helps reduce the challenges involved in cross-team collaboration. Essentially, SASE combines network security with WAN optimization. Modern DevOps teams are physically separate but must work together, requiring reliable and secure connections between team members. 

    The DevOps approach emphasizes time-to-market, so DevOps teams look for ways to accelerate the CI/CD cycle and push releases faster. An important part of the process is reducing the DevOps team’s reliance on the network and security teams. SASE solutions help optimize performance and enhance security, so the DevOps team doesn’t have to wait for the infrastructure team to configure resources. SASE gives DevOps teams the necessary control and operational cadence without compromising security or performance.

    Enhanced Networking

    SASE can improve the overall network performance by providing integrated failover and load balancing capabilities. DevOps teams must have reliable connectivity and cannot tolerate disruptions when deploying new software or fixing bugs. Fast, reliable application performance is key to the DevOps workflow. 

    The SASE architecture improves the networking, ensuring the organization’s edge devices, cloud resources, data center and remote users remain connected. The DevOps team doesn’t have to handle the infrastructure because it is self-healing, fully optimized, and secure. The solution automatically switches to another path if a line fails or a path becomes congested.

    Security By Default

    SASE protects DevOps projects with built-in security features. When implemented properly, it integrates many security technologies into the network stack. The DevOps team doesn’t have to worry about attackers intercepting sensitive information. Every security service shares the same, unified context to increase visibility and fill gaps that are often present in traditional security architectures. SASE mitigates the vulnerabilities exploited by attackers using NGFW, SWG, IPS, MDR and antivirus services in a single architecture.

    SASE can secure internal applications and their interactions, reducing the burden on the DevSecOps team. Applications running on a SASE-based SD-WAN benefit from the added protection of zero-trust network access (ZTNA) and software-defined perimeter (SDP). These technologies help ensure that all interactions between applications and endpoints are secure. 

    Proprietary apps are often too sensitive to expose to the public Internet. SASE secures these applications by obfuscating traffic, securing all entry points with NGFW, and restricting access with zero-trust network architecture. It constantly inspects all internal application traffic for cybersecurity threats. 

    Conclusion

    In this article, I explained the basics of SASE, which packages multiple networking and security solutions into one managed service. 

    SASE is giving organizations a new level of flexibility and agility with regard to their core infrastructure and is introducing the concept of security-by-design. Instead of fighting hard to “secure all the things,” we are moving nearer to a world where the “grid” our organization operates on is secure by default. This won’t make DevSecOps any less important. But it will allow us to build our applications and services within a secure, controlled hybrid environment.

  • Survey Predicts Massive Migration to the Cloud

    Survey Predicts Massive Migration to the Cloud

    A global survey of 1,600 enterprise IT decision-makers found more than half are working for organizations that plan to eliminate the use of data centers over the next two years.

    The survey was conducted by Aryaka, a provider of a secure access service edge (SASE) platform, and found a quarter of the respondents have closed 25% to 50% of their office sites; 75% of respondents said at least a quarter of their employees will remain remote permanently post-pandemic. Just under a third (32%) expect at least half of their workforce would be permanently remote.

    Despite the apparent accelerated shift to the cloud, the report found a full three-quarters of respondents (75%) are projecting at least a 10% growth in IT spending, with a quarter expecting IT budgets to grow 25% or more. Nevertheless, more than a third (36%) report they have IT cost concerns.

    David Ginsburg, vice president of product and solutions for Aryaka, said the shift to the cloud in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic is being driven mainly by digital business transformation initiatives that require applications be quickly built and managed by IT teams that are working from home themselves. With the pandemic entering the third year, a hybrid workforce that regularly shifts between home and the office is now permanent, he noted.

    Consequently, with more people working from home, nearly two-thirds of respondents (64%) said they will shift toward a SASE-based approach over the course of the coming year to provide secure access to cloud applications over a software-defined wide area network (SD-WAN). Over two-thirds of those respondents said they will opt for a managed SASE offering rather than build and maintain these platforms themselves.

    SASE was originally coined by Gartner to describe a cloud-delivered service that brought together networking and security offerings. Those offerings should include a firewall-as-a-service (FWaaS), secure web gateway (SWG), cloud access security broker (CASB) and zero-trust network access (ZTNA). In effect, it’s a secure software-defined wide-area network (SD-WAN). As organizations adopt SASE-based platforms and services, just under a third of respondents (61%) are recognizing that dynamic bandwidth reallocation will be a very important requirement as workers shift between the office and home.

    The transition to SASE involves setting a strategy (35%), phasing out of legacy virtual private networks (32%) and consolidating cloud security with zero-trust (29%). Top desired capabilities include SWG (47%), SD-WAN (36%) and FWaaS (28%). A full 41% reported that responsibility for networking and security decisions have now been consolidated into a single team. However, only slightly more than a third (34%) said security is a major priority.

    The implications of a shift to the cloud at this rate and level of scale are likely to have a profound impact on DevOps teams. While cloud infrastructure is designed to scale on demand, accessing applications across an SD-WAN can have a significant impact on application performance. The survey, however, finds only 29% of respondents are concerned about whether applications will perform properly. Nevertheless, well over two-thirds (69%) said there will be an increased focus on observability and control, while 42% noted identifying slow performance for remote and mobile users will be a key issue and 37% expected slow performance at the branch office to also be an issue. Lackluster application performance is a time sink, according to 42% of respondents.

    Naturally, many IT teams will add new tools and platforms to deploy and manage cloud applications. The Aryaka survey found that only slightly more than a quarter of respondents are concerned about the newness of the technology they might employ.

    The coming year is shaping up to be incredibly disruptive to the IT landscape. The challenge is making sure balance is maintained between cost, flexibility and application performance.

  • 4 Ways SASE Fuels DevOps Productivity

    4 Ways SASE Fuels DevOps Productivity

    Many enterprises are adopting secure access service edge (SASE) solutions as part of their digital transformation efforts. SASE, in a nutshell, merges together SD-WAN and security stacks to deliver secure networking and improved WAN performance, making it a logical choice for cloud-enabled businesses going through the throes of digital transformation. However, SASE offers other benefits, which may be of particular interest to DevOps teams.

    Let’s take a look at four ways SASE can enhance the productivity of DevOps teams.

    Reducing Collaboration Challenges

    SASE reduces the challenges associated with team collaboration. SASE, by design, integrates WAN optimization with cybersecurity. Today’s DevOps teams need to work together, despite being physically separated, and must have reliable, secure connectivity amongst the team. “DevOps are all about time-to-market, and DevOps teams are looking for ways to shorten their  CI/CD cycles. A critical part of that process is reducing their dependency on the networking and the security teams,” said Boaz Avigad, director of product marketing, CATO Networks. “Since SASE solutions already provide optimized performance and robust security, DevOps [teams] are free from waiting for infrastructure teams to provision the necessary resources. SASE provides DevOps the control and operational cadence they need without compromising performance or security.”

    SASE Improves Networking

    SASE improves overall network performance with integrated load balancing and failover capabilities. DevOps teams cannot afford to lose connectivity, especially when rolling out new iterations of software or resolving bugs. “For DevOps teams, fast and reliable application performance is critical,” said Avigad. “SASE architectures free DevOps [teams] from worrying about the infrastructure by connecting all the company’s edges, data centers, mobile users and cloud resources, with the same self-healing, secure and fully optimized global network. Should a line fail or a route become congested, SASE automatically switches to an alternate path.”

    Better Security Built In

    SASE helps to secure DevOps projects with native cybersecurity capabilities. When properly implemented, SASE integrates numerous security technologies directly into the network stack. “DevOps teams worry about information interception and protecting their applications from threats. All security services share a single, unified context, improving insight and closing the gaps in legacy security architectures; gaps attackers often exploit,” said Avigad. “SASE not only includes NGFW, IPS, SWG, AV and MDR services, it also converges them together into a single-pass architecture.”

    SASE Removes DevSecOps Burdens

    SASE secures internal applications, along with the interactions with those applications, which in turn helps to reduce the burdens on DevSecOps team members. Applications that run over SASE/SD-WANs are further secured by zero-trust network access (ZTNA) and software-defined perimeter (SDP), technologies that help to keep all interactions between an endpoint and an application secure. “Many proprietary applications are too sensitive to run over the public internet. SASE protects those applications by obfuscating traffic, protecting all entry points with a NGFW and restricting access with its zero-trust architecture,” said Avigad. “All internal application traffic is also continuously inspected for threats.”

    Adopting SASE for DevOps teams is beginning to make a lot of sense. The technology addresses many of the pain points that DevOps teams experience as businesses drive toward digital transformation. What’s more, the security benefits offered bring forth additional productivity, while also unifying the security stack. 

  • Cato Networks Offers Instant SD-WAN Service

    Cato Networks Offers Instant SD-WAN Service

    Cato Networks has added an instant-on capability to its software-defined wide area network service (SD-WAN) service to make it easier for IT teams to provide employees with remote access to applications.

    Dave Greenfield, technology evangelist for Cato Networks, said rather than having to configure and install a virtual private network (VPN) client on every device to access applications, IT teams can simply share a URL to provide network access via a single sign-on protocol without requiring client software. At a time when many IT teams are scrambling to allow every employee to work at home to help combat the spread of the COVID-19 coronavirus, the Cato Software Defined Perimeter (SDP) service provides an alternative approach to achieve that goal at scale, he said.

    The Cato SDP network is an instance of a global SD-WAN service co-managed by Cato Networks. IT teams still control who gains access to what applications using multifactor authentication, while Cato Networks manages the underlying network and security infrastructure, including all the firewalls and endpoint protection software. As such, Greenfield said, Cato SDP is one of the first instances of a service based on what Gartner is now describing as a secure access service edge (SASE) architecture.

    Greenfield said trying to scale access using legacy VPN software is problematic because it requires IT teams to acquire more software licenses and bandwidth, while end users are provided with passwords to access the corporate network, which can be easily hacked. And, perhaps most problematic, most VPNs limit the number of simultaneous users allowed on the network.

    Cato SDP provides access to a zero trust network environment that only provides access to applications that end users have been specifically authorized to use, said Greenfield, noting all of that can be accomplished in as little as 10 minutes.

    Cato SD-WAN

    Since the beginning of the COVID-19 outbreak, Greenfield said Cato Networks has seen a sharp increase in usage of its global network, which consists of points-of-presence residing in third-party data centers distributed around the world. This setup makes it possible to optimize application experiences based on where end users are physically accessing the internet.

    It may be a few months to as long as two years before the COVID-19 pandemic subsides. What today may be viewed as a singular disruptive event could very well be a harbinger for how organizations will need to work from now on. Even once IT teams get everyone in their organization up and running from home, many of them will have to ask themselves how long they are prepared to manage IT as a remote service. The emergence of SASE-based services provides an alternative co-managed approach that allows IT teams to rely on an external service provider without having to give up control over their applications to a managed service provider (MSP).

    Naturally, it may be a while before the current crisis subsides enough for organizations to realize they may need to fundamentally change the way they consume IT. The only thing that is for certain right now is that conversation is all but inevitable.

    — Mike Vizard