As cybercriminals continue to take advantage of the public cloud in their attacks, Sophos commissioned an independent survey of 3,521 IT managers across 26 countries* to reveal the reality of cloud security in 2020.
READ: ‘The State of Cloud Security 2020’ full report ►
The 2020 cloud security reality
The survey provides fresh new insight into the cybersecurity experiences of organizations using the public cloud, including:
Almost three-quarters of organizations hosting data or workloads in the public cloud experienced a security incident in the last year. Seventy percent of organizations reported they were hit by malware, ransomware, data theft, account compromise attempts, or cryptojacking in the last year.
Data loss/leakage is the number one concern for organizations. Data loss and leakage topped our list as the biggest security concern, with 44% of organizations seeing data loss as one of their top three focus areas.
Ninety-six percent of organizations are concerned about their current level of cloud security. Data loss, detection and response, and multi-cloud management top the list of the biggest concerns among organizations.
Multi-cloud organizations reported more security incidents in the last 12 months. Seventy-three percent of the organizations surveyed were using two or more public cloud providers and reported more security incidents as those using a single platform.
European organizations may have the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) to thank for the lowest attack rates of all regions. The GDPR guidelines’ focus on data protection, and well-publicized ransomware attacks have likely led to these lucrative targets becoming harder for cybercriminals to compromise in Europe.
Only one in four organizations see lack of staff expertise as a top concern despite the number of cyberattacks reported in the survey. When it comes to hardening security postures in the cloud, the skills needed to create good designs, develop clear use cases, and leverage third-party services for platform tools are crucial but underappreciated.
Two-thirds of organizations leave back doors open to attackers. Security gaps in misconfigurations were exploited in 66% of attacks, while 33% of attacks used stolen credentials to get into cloud provider accounts.
For the details behind these headlines, and to see how your country stacks up, read The State of Cloud Security 2020 report.
Secure the cloud with Sophos
However you’re using the public cloud, Sophos can help you keep it secure.
Secure all your cloud resources. Get a complete inventory of multi-cloud environments (virtual machines, storage, containers, IAM Users etc.). Reveal insecure deployments, suspicious access, and sudden spikes in cloud spend. Learn more
Secure your cloud workloads. Protect virtual machines, the virtual desktops running on those machines from the latest threats, including ransomware, fileless attacks, and server-specific malware. Learn more
Protect the network edge. Secure inbound and outbound traffic to your virtual network, virtual desktop environments, and provides secure remote access to private applications running in the cloud. Learn more
For more information and to discuss your cloud security needs, request a call back from one of security experts.
* Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, China, Colombia, Czech Republic, France, Germany, India, Italy, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, Netherlands, Nigeria, Philippines, Poland, Singapore, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Turkey, UAE, United Kingdom, United States
Net Universe offers all Sophos Devices and subscritpions also consultant services with worldwide Delivery Services. Send us an email to [email protected] for more information or visit https://www.netuniversecorp.com/sophos.
For this episode of Stories That Inspire, we’ve brought on board Rohit Thakral (CEO at Target Integration) and Aman Thakral (Business Head, India at Target Integration) to tell us how they have empowered businesses through digital transformation.
Read their story of becoming a Zoho Premium Partner and providing Zoho services globally from India, the USA, the UK, and Ireland.
Rithikha: Let’s start at the very beginning. What was Target Integration doing before partnering with Zoho?
Rohit: Target Integration commenced in 2008. We initially started the business with open-source products. The idea was to provide value-based business process management systems to customers. It was a time when all the installations were not in the cloud yet, and open source solutions were the thing. Slowly, open-source systems started fading and we decided to ride the cloud wave. Though much has changed from the beginning, our foundation—i.e. our vision has remained constant.
We empower business owners and managers by providing business management solutions tailored to your needs, and ongoing support throughout your journey with us.
Rithikha: Speaking of change, how has Target Integration changed in terms of operations? We’d like to hear more about your foray into the SaaS market.
Aman: The current software market is rapidly growing. Back then, the cloud wasn’t popular and we had to work hard to educate people about it. Now, it has redefined the future and has become the de facto standard.
Rohit: Intending to create a cloud-first world, Target Integration partnered with several providers back then and started promoting the software in the industry. We slowly realized that we should focus on our customers’ business processes rather than on the infrastructure.
Aman: The market has consultants on one hand and software providers on the other. We believe that there’s no “one fit for all” software solution. We bridge that gap and have redefined ourselves as an entity that provides the best consultation and the perfect implementation!
Rithikha: How did Zoho come into the picture? What inspired you to get associated with Zoho?
Rohit: Zoho has a suite of 45+ applications like Zoho One, Zoho CRM, Zoho Desk, Zoho Recruit, Zoho People, and Zoho Creator. It is not its stand-alone applications that make Zoho exceptional but the fact that they provide the entire ecosystem. What we love most about Zoho is that the software is integratable, customizable, and extendable.
Aman: Zoho has few partners who promote all its applications. As a premium Zoho Partner, we are proud that we are into multiple domains and have multiple exposures. With best practices being used across the platform, we offer the unique experience of Zoho across different regions: Ireland, the USA, the UK, Greece, and India.
Rithikha: Talking about crafting a unique Zoho experience, are there any best practices you follow when it comes to implementations?
Rohit: The differentiating factor at Target Integration is that we look at business needs rather than technology. Our core responsibility as a Zoho partner is to collect the core requirements of the customer. Once the requirements of the business are gathered, we analyse and review them with a holistic view. Then, we come up with an implementation plan to serve them with the best possible solutions for their business. One should always remember that the product is the same, what matters is the customer experience. Being honest and simplifying the process for them is crucial.
Aman: We believe in leveraging the power of integration. The key to our Zoho implementations lies in crafting a full-fledged process management system. This not only helps organizations automate their business processes but also helps their talents perform more efficiently and effectively. This helps us stay grounded to our mission:
Every business should be able to leverage the power of their business insights.
Rithikha: Being an enterprise, how are you split up as a team to handle the operations? How do you train your staff?
Aman: We are decentralized as an organization. Predominantly, we have a consultation team, a requirement gathering team, and then an implementation team. We also have individual teams working on different products that are further divided into sub-teams.
Rohit: We believe that when an employee dedicates time and effort with us, it’s our responsibility to create value addition for them with regard to their skills. Most employees are technically sound, but they are not well-equipped to use it for the best business practices. That’s where our biggest challenge lies! So, we cross-train them on business processes, rather than just the software alone! Our strength lies in our team. We have a robust team who are Zoho experts and masters in understanding business.
Rithikha: Your journey must have seen tremendous growth! Can you please tell us about it?
Rohit: Our journey has been transformational. We have worked with 35+ industries around the globe. Implementing solutions for different business types, at different business verticals, and in different geographical locations has given us so much exposure. We have become experts in implementing CRM for associations, clubs, and non-profit organizations.
Today, we have offices in the USA, Ireland, and the UK, as well as three offices in India (Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore). We also have a development centre in Greece and are planning to grow it into a fully functional sales office. We are also working on extending the Indian offices to Tier 2 cities like Chandigarh, Jaipur, and Pune.
Rithikha: That’s incredible! Could you tell us about your marketing efforts? Which is your most trusted customer acquisition channel?
Rohit: Our self-driven business primarily comes from our customer references! People moving from one company to another take us and Zoho with them. Once they trust us and believe that we can deliver, they introduce us to other customers. That’s how we have built our business globally.
Aman: Customers are more educated than before. It’s important to make sure that we have the right information available to our customers at the right time. Providing educational content in the form of webinars and blogs has helped us generate leads. Target Integration has a strong marketing team. We work very closely with the team at Zoho. This helps us generate the right content.
Rithikha: What do you foresee for Target Integration in 2020?
Aman: Zoho is now competing with big players in the market like Salesforce and Dynamics 365. These days, customers look for a very robust system. There has been a market shift in terms of requirements. Initially, it was just lead management, contact management, and sales management, but now customers look for integrations with e-commerce portals or with tools like Amazon and lead portals like IndiaMART. Integrated systems will be the game-changers.
In 2020, we expect the demand for integrations with third-party tools to grow. Increased geographical enrichment and geographical reach can make this easier. From the Target Integration point of view, we will be expanding to more cities in terms of a physical base.
Rohit: While extending in India is a significant market growth for us, in 2020, we would like to look at other markets as well. Moreover, we also aim at penetrating the market by having partnerships with associates and other CRM/ ERP providers in the region.
Rithikha: This year has been so unpredictable. How are you handling the COVID situation? Would you like to share any tips that benefited you with other partners?
Rohit: This is a tough time for everyone. Fortunately, we are in the cloud! Thanks to the hard work and commitment of our team, remote assistance and cloud collaboration tools were our companions in this journey. We should remember that we are together in this. It’s time to help each other.
We have extended our business consultancy support free of charge (for up to two hours) for anyone seeking it. Also, we have conducted webinars (in regional languages) on Zoho Apps for remote team management and online collaboration.
Along with Zoho, we were a part of the implementation of the first COVID-19 Distress Call Center in Jammu and Kashmir, India for the citizens of Srinagar District.
Aman: The global pandemic has taught us a lot. It is time for us to ensure the health, safety, and welfare of our employees and customers. Being proactive and persistent with customer communication can positively impact customer experience and help create goodwill. Timely communication is crucial during this crisis. This is a good time to empower and up-skill our employees. (Thanks to Zoho’s online training and certification!) Also, we could revamp the content on our website and create awareness by leveraging the power of social media.
Rithikha: What’s your take on competition? How do you measure your performance as an organization?
Rohit: I believe that competition makes us faster, but collaboration makes us better.
Rather than competing with someone, we look forward to creating partners in every city, county, and country.
Synergy is greater when we work together. That’s why we are happy to collaborate. Our Zoho Partner family has been a pillar of support. Zoho Inspire has been a great way for us to strengthen our ties with other Zoho Partners. At the end of the day, it boils down to mutual help and collective growth!
Aman: When it comes to measuring our performance, it’s internal competition, with ourselves. We look at our past, our future potential, and then set metrics. It’s not projected or measured against anybody else! We strive for self-improvement. Customer feedback plays a significant role here. We still go by the age-old-adage “Customer is king!”
Rithikha: That’s inspiring. So you have attended Zoho Inspire!
Aman: Of course! We have been a regular attendee at Zoho Inspire. We love this event and keep looking forward to it. During our bonding sessions at the event, we share success stories on how we win over tough clients. Our discussions range from working on lost deals, to which product could have been a better solution for the customer, to how we could remain consistent in our work deliverables. My gosh! I’ve got so much more to tell.
Rohit: Zoho Inspire has done a tremendous job by building a collaborative platform for partner engagement. Apart from bringing to the table the best industry practices, it enables us to exchange ideas, obtain insights, and foster great relationships.
Aman: We admire how Zoho builds lasting relationships and has an amazing organization culture. We are assimilating the same culture at our workspace too. Keep up the good work, team Zoho! May you keep performing at your best!
Rithikha: Thank you. We wish you the very best in your future endeavours. Let’s keep rooting for each other!
Any business, whether it’s big or small, has to make purchases from vendors from time to time as all supplies cannot be managed in-house. When the purchase frequency and the number of suppliers increase, it can become difficult to manage orders and keep track of payments, leading to poor vendor relationships.
To handle this, Zoho Books has introduced the Vendor Portal, which lets vendors access their transactions with you, communicate, review orders, and much more. It’s secure and super convenient for your vendors—they can skip the lengthy clarifying emails and get direct access to the transaction information they need.
Enabling the portal can help you:
Quickly process orders and negotiate prices
The purchase orders you’ve created will be available immediately in your vendors portal. This gives the vendor a record of the items and quantities you require and the prices you’re planning to pay. Transactions get uploaded in real time, so vendors can view the orders instantly and share their feedback or work out new prices in the comments section if needed.
Review transaction documents and create bills
When your vendor has shipped your order or has it ready to dispatch, they can take a picture of their invoice and upload it in the portal. You can then review the invoice and approve it to create a bill in your Zoho Books organization and an invoice in their portal.
Share contact details easily
If your vendor has changed their operating location or contact details, they can edit their information in the portal and it will be automatically updated in your Zoho Books account. Similarly, if you’ve changed your address, your vendor can see your new billing and shipping address in the portal and always have updated shipment details.
Converse and collaborate effortlessly
Discuss orders, comment on invoices, and work together to process your purchases. Any time your vendor wants to send you a quick update, they can hit the Send Email button from the portal home page and message you right away.
What’s in it for your vendors?
Insightful and actionable dashboard
The home page in the vendor portal is similar to your dashboard in Zoho Books. It displays the amounts for outstanding invoices, any credits available, the details of the last payment received from the customer, and any documents that have been uploaded.
Secure access to the portal
Once you’ve enabled the portal, your vendors will be able to log in to it from the email invite you sent. You can set up a password for the portal, which your vendors can update as required.
View, print, upload, and comment on transactions
Your vendors will be able to view all the transactions you’ve created for them, add comments and upload images of invoices they’ve created so you can verify and convert them to transactions. All the transactions and statements of accounts can be downloaded or printed for their use.
How to get started
You can enable the portal from the Vendors module. Just click the More dropdown and select Configure Vendor Portal for the required vendor. You can learn more about setting up and accessing the portal from our help document.
Enabling the portal increases transparency and ensures your vendor is always in the loop. We’ve mentioned just a few things you can do using the portal. Do try it out let us know how else it helps you meet your business challenges. If you have any questions or feedback, leave a comment below or send an email to [email protected].
Today, many of us working remotely due to COVID-19 can relate. Virtual meetings have become even more vital to how we connect, communicate and get work done, which is one of the reasons we made Google Meet available for free to everyone back in May. And while video conferencing is now part of our daily lives, it comes with its challenges, too. Aside from the occasional adorable interruptions, there’s also more potential for accidental exclusion. And when that happens, we risk missing out on valuable perspectives, creativity and successful outcomes.
Fortunately, there are ways to make remote meetings better and more inclusive for all.
Plan ahead
The more planning you do, the better remote meetings can be. Share your agenda, process and materials ahead of time so everyone has a chance to gather their thoughts and show up ready to contribute meaningfully.
Everyone processes information differently; for instance, for some neurodivergent people, vague information can be stressful and difficult to respond to. And for introverted people, the same can lead to less participation.
Check that the platforms your team uses for real-time chat, presentations, feedback or whiteboarding work with different assistive technologies that people with disabilities may use. You can search online, on the company’s help center, or contact them directly. (Here’s some accessibility info for Google Meet and Google Docs, Sheets, Slides and Forms.)
If you’re tied to using a specific platform, like a brainstorming tool without captions, tell everyone about its limitations ahead of time and work together to find a workaround.
You can also send participants an anonymous feedback survey with Google Forms asking how to improve the experience.
Set ground rules, norms and time limits
From the start, establish a clear process for the meeting. This can include when there should be discussion, when someone has the floor for an extended period, how to take turns and what signals the moderator will use to (politely!) cut in to keep things moving along.
It’s also essential to normalize parenting and caregiving. Make sure your colleagues know caregiving responsibilities can be attended to and prioritized, and discuss that it’s OK (and sometimes even fun!) for kids, pets and other family members to interrupt calls. And remember, anyone can be a caretaker regardless of age, gender or living situation, so include everyone in this discussion.
If meetings are longer than an hour (and were intended to be), offer breaks. Listening fatigue due to cognitive load can occur for deaf and hard-of-hearing participants, but breaks are likely welcome to anyone spending the majority of their day looking at a screen.
Take advantage of remote meeting technology
Before you join meetings, be close enough to the mic and camera so participants can easily see faces to clearly read lips, tone and body language. Using real-time closed captions (CC) is also a good idea (here’s how to turn on English CC when presenting in Google Meet and Google Slides), as is adding a phone dial-in option, which G Suite customers can easily do in Google Meet.
And if you’re sharing any Docs or Slides, make sure the content is easily visible for everyone. (For more details about making sure meetings and the content you share during them are accessible, check out this blog post about creating inclusivity while we work from home.)
Leave time for empathy
There’s a lot going on in the world, from a global pandemic to the quest for racial equity. It’s important to recognize that people may be in difficult situations and feeling a multitude of emotions.
If you are leading a video call, plan to take some time at the beginning to acknowledge how people may be feeling, offer your support and understanding. Even though meetings have a specific agenda, it’s also important to create a safe, no-pressure space for people to share–if they want to–and to connect to one another.
Hopefully these tips will help make your video meetings more welcoming for everyone you work and meet with.
Because it’s growing so rapidly, the media industry has to constantly adapt to changes in consumer behavior. Employees have to be very creative, always developing content that is consistent with consumer trends. Employees feel the most creative freedom at work when they are productive and engaged in their jobs.
To promote this, you have to level up your HR operations to meet the demands of the modern workforce. HR software can help, enabling your organization to move away from traditional HR practices. Here’s how HR software benefits the media sector:
Improves productivity by creating workflows to automate important HR tasks. This can be beneficial for the media sector as employees are dispersed in different locations.
Enables employees to brainstorm anytime no matter where they are with features like online forums, internal chats, employee directories, and more.
Helps you to set clear goals for your employees, allowing them to work consistently and stay motivated.
Provides all the technical sophistication that is required to nurture and retain talent.
Streamlines shift scheduling by allowing you to create shifts weekly, every two weeks, or once a month.
Read more about the benefits of HR Software for the media sector.
In 2017, we announced that we would replace classic Sites with new Sites, and in 2019 we announced that domains will have until the end of 2021 to complete the transition. Now, we’re providing a more detailed timeline, as well as new tools to help you and your users manage the transition.
Timeline to fully transition to new Sites by end of 2021
Here’s a detailed look at the expected timeline for the transition from classic Sites to new Sites:
Currently available – Classic Sites Manager, a tool which can help admins and users manage the transition to new Sites. See more details below.
Starting August 13, 2020 – New Sites will become the default option for website creation. See more details below.
Starting May 2021 – New website creation will no longer be available in classic Sites. This means that any new websites created in your organization will only be in new Sites.
Starting October 2021 – Editing of any remaining classic Sites will be disabled.
Starting December 2021 – When users try to visit a classic Site, they will no longer see the website content. Any remaining classic Sites will automatically be:
Downloaded as an archive.
Replaced with a draft in the new Sites experience for site owners to review and publish.
Enable new Sites for users today
If you haven’t done so already, we recommend that you enable new Sites for all user groups that don’t already have access within your domain, and disable creation of new classic Sites. This will help reduce the number of classic Sites which get created and then need to be migrated. Your users will still be able to view and edit existing classic Sites as needed. Use our Help Center to learn more about turning on new Sites for your users.
New Classic Sites Manager tool now available
A new tool, Classic Sites Manager, is now available. It provides a view of your classic Sites, the ability to export a summary to Google Sheets for project management, options to convert classic Sites, and take bulk actions to archive or delete sites. Currently, super admins will be able to see and manage all classic Sites in their domain, and users will be able to see and manage classic Sites they own. Use these guides to learn more about how to use the Classic Sites Manager tool: guidance for G Suite admins, guidance for end users.
New Sites the default option starting on August 13, 2020
Starting August 13, 2020, new Sites will become the default option for website creation. This means that if you have both classic Sites and new Sites enabled, when users go to sites,google.com, they’ll be redirected to sites.google.com/new. From there, users can see and manage new Sites, as well as create sites with new Sites. Users will still be able to use classic Sites easily by clicking the “back to classic Sites” button on the new Sites homepage.
Who’s impacted
Admins and end users
Why you’d use it
Since launching new Sites, we’ve listened to and incorporated your feedback, and top requests are now included in the new Sites experience. These include:
Admin permissions that allow you to control your users’ ability to edit and create sites within your domain.
Section layouts and pre-built templates that let users create websites with fewer clicks and less site creation expertise.
Version history that allows users to see their edit history, revert and restore previous versions, and review the history of who made changes.
New tile types that let users be more expressive with website content, including a table of contents, image carousels, collapsible text, and more.
Custom URLs and publishing to an audience that let users share their website content.
Getting started
Admins:
New Sites default: This change will take place by default if you have both classic Sites and new Sites enabled. You can turn new Sites on or off for users at the OU or group level. Visit the Help Center to learn more about how to enable new Sites.
Classic Sites Manager console: Use our Help Center to learn more about the Classic Sites Manager and plan for your transition using this migration guide.
End users:
Rollout pace
New Sites default:
Classic Sites Manager tool:
This feature is available now for all users.
Availability
Available to all G Suite customers and users with personal Google accounts.
As the arrival of COVID-19 forced much of the events industry to hit pause on in-person events, many pivoted to virtual events. While Backstage has helped businesses run thousands of offline events in our two years of existence, we realized the current need is for a virtual event management solution. So we got to work.
To help you run the show from wherever you are, we’re excited to introduce Zoho Backstage OnAir. This opens up endless possibilities to connect and engage with your audience virtually. OnAir offers the ease and simplicity you’ve come to expect from Backstage, but for your virtual events. Let’s look at how.
Event live cast
Easily broadcast your sessions to your attendees. Bring more context to your sessions by sharing course materials, presentations, and more. You can even share your screen or use the virtual whiteboard to explain topics in-depth.
Polls, questions, and more
Light up your sessions with various engagement tools—ask questions, run polls, and chat with your audience.
Post-session analytics
Discover how engaged your attendees were with the help of engagement metrics. Learn about the most popular sessions and speakers. Run a customized, post-session survey to get deeper insights.
Want to know what else is included? Check out the complete list of features here.
Given this new addition, you might be wondering, “Will virtual events replace live events altogether?” At Backstage, we don’t think they will.
However, we do believe that we’ll see live events getting transformed into something better: hybrid events, a combination of in-person and online events. In fact, we think the virtual component will only help enhance the overall event experience and put organizers in touch with more attendees, irrespective of where they are located.
And that’s where Zoho Backstage is headed—comprehensive software that helps event organizers run both online and offline events.
That’s not all
Incidentally, the launch of OnAir also marks two years since Zoho Backstage launched! The first release for Zoho Backstage focused on features essential for event organizers to get started, like an event website builder, agenda planner, event promotions, and a couple of features to build attendee engagement.
Earlier this year, we launched one of our favorite features—BadgeUp—to help organizers customize and design their event badges. We also realized how different each event is and the need to customize roles and permissions accordingly in the process of managing the event. That’s why we enabled organizers to create their own roles and set their permissions as required.
And those are just some of the updates from the last couple of years. Here’s a full list, in case you’re interested.
In just two years of helping event hosts run successful events, we’ve had lots to learn and contribute. Here are some stats that we’d love to share with you:
14930 LIVE Events
1826 Online Events
372461 Attendees
None of this would’ve been possible without the constructive criticism and encouragement from our friends and customers. We’d like to thank you for your love and support. We look forward to continue working with you.
One more thing
We recently launched our blog series, The Green Room, to share all our insights and updates about the event industry. If you haven’t already, check it out and let us know what you think about it.
Veena Thangavel
Veena is a marketer at Zoho. She likes writing about people and technology. If you like what she writes, feel free to share them. If you have any queries, please put them in the comments below.
With ever increasing network congestion, having the tools to optimize your important business applications is becoming increasingly important.
In this third in a series of articles on making the most of the great new features in XG Firewall v18, we’re going to focus on the tools available to you to optimize your important business application traffic using the new Xstream Network Flow FastPath and the new SD-WAN Policy Based Routing options.
Xstream FastPath Application Acceleration
In our last two articles, we covered the Xstream architecture and the new DPI engine as well as the new TLS Inspection in XG Firewall v18. The Network Flow FastPath is another key component of the new Xstream architecture and provides application acceleration for trusted traffic.
The Network Flow FastPath can direct trusted traffic that doesn’t require security scanning into the fast lane through the system. This not only minimizes latency and accelerates that application traffic through the firewall, it also has the added benefit of not engaging the DPI engine and TLS inspection resources for traffic that doesn’t require inspection.
This frees up those resources for traffic that actually needs it – creating added performance headroom in the process.
How it works
Initially, all traffic flows are processed by the Firewall stack and passed to the DPI engine for further identification. Once an application traffic flow is determined to be “trusted”, the Network Flow FastPath is directed to handle the packet flow directly and shuttle the packets through on the FastPath, bypassing the DPI engine.
Traffic can be accelerated onto the Network Flow FastPath in two ways:
Automatically: If the application matches a Server Name Indication (SNI) from SophosLabs for traffic that is considered trustworthy and tamper proof such as video and audio streaming services (Netflix, Spotify, Pandora, etc.), secure updates fetched directly from within the application (from Microsoft, Apple, Adobe, Sophos, etc.) or VoIP and other streaming protocols (such as SIP, FIX, RDP, etc.)
Policy: If there is a firewall rule associated with that specific application traffic that accelerates it onto the FastPath by not flagging it for security scanning.
You might be wondering, when would it make sense to accelerate application traffic on the FastPath, or in other words, what can be trusted? Traffic such as streaming media that is not active code-based is a perfect example of traffic that can be trusted.
Due to the streaming structure of the traffic and how it’s reassembled for playback, it’s not possible to inject malware into this kind of traffic flow making it an ideal candidate for FastPath acceleration. This type of traffic includes all popular streaming services such as Netflix and Spotify, but also VoIP and collaboration applications such as Zoom, GotoMeeting, Skype for Business, Microsoft Teams Calls, and others.
And of course, these communication and collaboration applications are among the most important in any business, which makes them ideal for FastPath acceleration.
Applications that enable users to download updates or files, are NOT good candidates for FastPath acceleration as files can obviously contain active code and be malicious. In general, in the interest of security, never create a FastPath rule for general web browsing or file sharing sites or applications.
Firewall Rules in XG Firewall v18
Firewall rules in XG Firewall v18 are very similar in their construction to previous releases, making migrations easy. This video provides a great in-depth look at firewall and NAT rule configuration in XG Firewall v18:
We will cover NAT rules in a future article in this series but today, let’s review how to create a firewall rule to accelerate trusted traffic on the FastPath. It couldn’t be more straightforward and intuitive: simply identify the destination application networks (FQDNs) or services…
And select “None” for Security Features and do not select any of the check boxes. This will ensure that traffic will be accelerated on the FastPath and not redirected through the DPI engine for unnecessary security scanning.
It’s that easy!
Application SD-WAN Policy Based Routing
Another new and improved capability in XG Firewall v18 is SD-WAN Policy Based Routing (PBR). Just as you want your important business application’s path through the firewall optimized and accelerated on the FastPath, you may also want to ensure your application’s path to the cloud or a branch office is similarly optimized. That’s where SD-WAN PBR comes in.
XG Firewall v18 adds user, group, and application-based traffic selection criteria to XG Firewall’s SD-WAN routing configuration. This allows you to route important business application traffic out a preferred ISP WAN link or a branch office VPN connection while less important traffic utilizes a different route.
This video provides a great overview of how to take advantage of the new SD-WAN PBR capabilities in XG Firewall v18 for application optimization, and SD-WAN routing.
Synchronized SD-WAN
XG Firewall v18 has evolved SD-WAN further with the introduction of Synchronized SD-WAN, a new Sophos Synchronized Security feature that offers additional benefits with SD-WAN application routing. Synchronized SD-WAN leverages the added clarity and reliability of application identification that comes with the sharing of Synchronized Application Control information between Sophos-managed endpoints and XG Firewall.
Synchronized Application Control can positively identify 100% of all networked applications, including evasive, encrypted, obscure, and custom applications and now these previously unidentified applications can also be added to SD-WAN routing policies. This provides a level of application routing control and reliability that other firewalls can’t match.
Here’s a summary of the resources available to help you make the most of the new features in XG Firewall v18, including application FastPath acceleration and SD-WAN Policy Routing:
If you’re new to Sophos XG Firewall, learn more about the great benefits and features XG Firewall can deliver to your network.
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Organizational growth often leads to the rapid expansion of the workforce and the addition of branch offices. This, combined with the transition to a teleworker environment, can place significant demands on existing infrastructure in terms of bandwidth requirements, access control, and secure workflows and transactions that are not only multiplying but now originating from outside the traditional network. And WAN environments that rely on dedicated MPLS connections become increasingly expensive while providing limited flexibility and functionality when it comes to things like cloud access, security, and application performance.
Large distributed enterprises in the manufacturing services industry understand more than most the need for business agility. In today’s increasingly competitive digital marketplace, they need to stay connected to anticipate and respond to shifting consumer demands, provide the best possible experience to their customers, and address the challenges of providing a robust work environment while maintaining reliable business continuity in a time of digital innovation and increasing cyber threats.
SD-WAN to Achieve Business Agility
One large manufacturing and services organization, with a single dedicated WAN link at every branch location, began experiencing frequent outages that had a severe impact on their workforce and customer experience with business-critical applications. Such connectivity issues, especially in an industry that relies on continuously managing the delicate balance between supply and demand, can negatively impact customer satisfaction and business outcomes.
With over 1,200 employees, and a distributed infrastructure across eastern and central Europe, this organization’s branch offices also had a wide variety of connection types in place, with some branch offices using MPLS/satellite, others using DSL, and a majority using LTE as their only available link for data center connectivity and internet access.
To sustain and accelerate growth, this organization needed continuous connectivity. In fact, it was a top priority for their Digital Innovation strategy. They also understood that they needed to augment their existing WAN links with LTE backup across all branches to support an active/active load balancing and failover architecture designed to maintain business-critical applications such as Point of Sale, camera feeds, and automation tools.
They were keen on adopting an SD-WAN solution best suited to their flexible deployment needs. This included a solution that combined connectivity and security through a centralized management interface, application awareness combined with high-speed SSL inspection, and local breakout security for direct cloud access from each branch office. In addition, visibility and control needed to extend across all branch networks, combined with precise segmentation for security policy enforcement across users, applications, and devices.
Fortinet’s Secure SD-WAN solution fits all of these requirements, and much more.
Fortinet’s Secure SD-WAN Solution for Digital Innovation
With several SD-WAN vendors vying for selection as part of their proof of concept trials, this organization was quick to discover that Fortinet’s robust Secure SD-WAN solution differentiated itself by providing a fully integrated solution that combined business agility, optimal connectivity, strong security, and best user experience into a single form factor that was easy to deploy and manage.
Fortinet Secure SD-WAN offered hybrid WAN traffic steering, QoS prioritization, application acceleration, and automation combined with a robust Next-Generation Firewall that supported a full stack of enterprise-class security functions. And it was available as a consolidated, powerful desktop appliance that also included built-in LTE. As a result, this organization was able to validate that the Fortinet solution would support all use cases for their current business needs, as well as future innovations—something no other vendor was able to do.
Secure SD-WAN Key Benefits
A few of the key benefits and immediate business outcomes provided by Fortinet’s Secure SD-WAN solution include:
Deep Integration Combined with Product Consolidation: The needs for LTE as primary (replacing satellite-based MPLS links) and secondary links were easily met with FortiGate 40F-3G4G appliance with built-in LTE and the custom-built SD-WAN ASIC chip, the SOC4. And because these appliances include a full stack of security tightly integrated with advanced SD-WAN functionality, they were able to reduce the number of devices that needed to be deployed at each branch office. And with support for active/active load balancing and failover, they could provide consistent connectivity across all branch offices to ensure the best possible performance for their business-critical applications.
Best User Experience: Given the nature of their manufacturing business, their goal was to deploy a streaming camera video feed in the near future aimed at providing connectivity and access control at their branch locations. Fortinet Secure SD-WAN’s ability to prioritize high bandwidth applications and ensure better access control with its branch-to-branch VPN overlay ensured the best user experience combined with reliable, uninterrupted service.
Strong Security Posture with Intent-based Segmentation: Secure SD-WAN’s ability to natively support intent-based segmentation enabled this organization to achieve better protection for direct access to cloud and internet resources while enforcing security policies based on the roles of users, devices, and applications. This, combined with a comprehensive, centralized content inspection to provide visibility into traffic, enabled the organization to limit breaches to specific network segments by preventing malicious content from passing over from one network segment to another.
Flexible Deployment with Advanced Networking Support: By combining zero-touch deployment for ease of deployment with advanced networking functions, such as advanced dynamic routing with BGP, allowed this organization to seamlessly deploy the Fortinet solution at their data centers, disaster recovery hubs, and many of their branches without having to redesign existing network configurations.
Extending Security to Branch Networks with SD-Branch: For those branch offices where outages were not an option, the organization was able to quickly implement hardware redundancy with active/active FortiGate appliances, and securely extend direct internet access via LTE using FortiExtender.
Centralized Management and Reporting: Fortinet’s unique single pane of glass management allowed this organizations to easily deploy Fortinet Secure SD-WAN at remote branch locations while maintaining a single, integrated security and networking framework. This reduced the need for additional IT staff while improving visibility and control across the entire network infrastructure.
All Objectives Met, and with Significant Cost Savings
Unlike most SD-WAN solutions, which require the deployment of multiple solutions, including a complex overlay of siloed security solutions, Fortinet’s Secure SD-WAN was able to meet all of the requirements of the multinational manufacturing organization with a single, easy to deploy and manage appliance. Not only were they able to meet their deployment goals, but they also managed to reduce their capital and operational expenses at the same time. That’s because Fortinet offers to most robust and complete SD-WAN solution in the industry.
Take a security-driven approach to networking to improve user experience and simplify operations at the WAN edge with Fortinet’s Secure SD-WAN solution.
Read these customer case studies to see how De Heus and Burger King Brazil implemented Fortinet’s Secure SD-WAN to alleviate network complexity, increase bandwidth, and reduce security costs.
Engage in our Fortinet user community (Fuse). Share ideas and feedback, learn more about our products and technology, or connect with peers.
Fortinet was built on the premise that a network firewall should not just deliver a full range of tightly integrated network and security functions – a goal that many other NGFW solutions still fail to achieve – but do so with the scale and performance that today’s most demanding hyperscale environments require. And all at a price point that doesn’t break the bank so that the decision makers don’t have to make a tradeoff between best of security at a scale vs. the cost.
That premise starts with two essential strategies. The first is to offer solutions designed to actually operate together as part of a single security system, sharing threat intelligence to achieve a strong security posture. The second one is to offer scale with not just a collection of mostly isolated security systems wrapped together in a cumbersome and expensive cluster for scale. That first objective is what has driven the development and delivery of the Fortinet Security Fabric. The second strategy involves developing active, purpose-built hardware processors designed to accelerate the performance of essential security functions within a single system.
Announcing the FortiGate 4400F Network Firewall
The truth is, very few vendors have made more than a token effort at achieving the first, and none even seem to have a game plan for achieving the second. And even if they were to start, any sort of solution would be years away. ASIC development is a long and expensive process, and other security vendors are already more than a decade behind.
Fortinet already has two purpose-built SPUs (Security Processing Units) in place that power our security hardware, with a new hybrid processor designed just for SD-WAN. Our content processors (CPs) are designed to accelerate critical security functions, such as inspecting encrypted traffic, and our network processors (NPs) accelerate networking functions. And these aren’t just fledgling solutions. This past February we released our 7th generation network processor (the NP7). The first FortiGate NGFW solutions powered by NP7 were released soon after, as the FG-1800F and FG-4200F.
Today, the launch of the FortiGate 4400F continues our commitment to delivering SPU-powered products capable of providing the fuel needed for digital innovation. It is positioned to support the most processor-intensive security environments of today – environments that will quickly become the norm of tomorrow.
Today’s Networks Require Security Solutions that Combine Productivity with Hyper-efficiency
Increasing productivity, even with a remote workforce, is a critical goal of many organizations. But with only so many working hours in a day, productivity gains rely exclusively on the efficiency of the tools being used. But in today’s environments, securing the proliferation of new applications is only part of the challenge for today’s firewalls. The volume of data being processed also needs to be addressed, and this is where traditional firewalls fall down flat.
Imagine a cutting-edge pharmaceutical research company looking to build new medicines while delivering value to shareholders. Testing, modeling, and 3D rendering are key to that process. These functions require the processing and transferring of very large datasets – often tens of Terabytes or more – as quickly as possible to AI/ML simulators. This enables new medicines to be developed faster, with lowered costs and reduced risk to human life.
But that data also needs to be secured. The surreptitious injection of bad data can ruin months or years of research. And competitors and even nation-states may be looking to circumvent the time and expense of research by stealing this intellectual property. But without specially designed security hardware, few security devices on the market are able to keep up.
The FortiGate 4400F changes all of that natively by supporting multiple 100Gbps connections, enabling the inspection and protection of critical Elephant Flows by enabling organizations to make the most efficient use of their existing investments in 40G and 100G WAN links without compromising security at any layer of the network as defined by the OSI model.
But this is only the beginning. The next generation of smart cars, smart cities, and smart infrastructures – including transportation, power grids, manufacturing, and more – all augmented by AI and Machine Learning – will require the management and processing of massive amounts of Big Data. Providing sufficient performance and processing to support these new architectures will require even faster and more efficient infrastructures. And for most security vendors, this is a looming challenge that isn’t even on their drawing boards – which puts the future of the digital revolution at risk.
A Hyperconnected World Requires Hyper-Efficient Firewalls
The transition from 4G to 5G likewise promises huge potential for more efficient systems, the more rapid delivery of increasingly rich media, and a host of new applications and services still unseen that will benefit users and providers equally. But security is lagging from traditional security vendors still relying on off-the-shelf processors to power their devices.
Mobile network operators (MNOs) need a solution like the FortiGate 4400F that can ensure security and business continuity as 4G expands and they evolve their services to include 5G. The evolution of 4G and the introduction of 5G create the perfect storm for new levels of security performance and hyperscale needed to support the exploding number of devices connected to the mobile network. New security performance and scalability standards will need to be met to support the hyperconnected world where users talk to users and machines, where machine to machine communication becomes the norm, and data processing, decision-making, and transactions – often involving massive amounts of data – are measured in microseconds.
Likewise, mobile users adopting broadband wireless in 5G want very quick downloads of rich media, a very fast gaming experience, and the ability to generate ad hoc edge networks. Service providers need security solutions like the FortiGate 4400F to support and secure their massively scalable networks while ensuring fast user connection setup and the lowest possible latency. If not, the user experience will suffer, and revenue loss will follow as customers abandon the provider.
Securing Data in Transit Remains Pivotal
Enabling providers to scale their radio access networks (RAN) and core infrastructures is already a challenge for nearly all modern security solutions. But adding the delivery of user data by leveraging hardware accelerated Suite-B encryption is an even more daunting task – and one that virtually every traditionally developed security solution fails to deliver. The FortiGate 4400F, however, delivers tens of thousands of tunnels while delivering 420Gbps of IPSec throughput, combined with a security compute rating of 11X better than other solutions for Security Gateway (SecGW) deployments. The versatility and performance of FortiGate Network Firewalls really futureproofs company investments because solutions like the FortiGate 4400F enable them to build high-speed, high-performance Data Center Interconnects. For situations that require encrypting at high speeds, IPsec can be turned on non-intrusively to support high-bandwidth IPsec tunnel flows.
Hyperscalability is as Essential as Hyperperformance
Performance is only half of the equation. Scalability is equally essential. With the greatest vertical scaling capability within a 4RU form factor, the FortiGate 4400F not only supports a very high influx of connections – 10 million connections per second and a security compute rating of 12x – it also reduces power cooling and rack space while offering the industry’s best price performance. And even at that level of scaling, you can still turn on essential Layer 4 firewalling and layer it with volumetric-based DDoS (distributed denial of service) attack prevention without impacting performance – ensuring all of your services are protected from bad actors.
Best-of-Breed Advanced Layer 7 Security for Everyone
FortiGate 4400F offers SSL inspection, including TLS 1.3, that is 6.5x better than competing products to provide full visibility into threats that hide in encrypted channels and the ability to detect unsanctioned applications. Inspection alone, however, is not sufficient. A strong security posture requires both threat protection and detection, and the FortiGate 4400F not only delivers two times the threat protection performance of its competitors, it is also powered by AI-enabled FortiGuard and FortiSandbox services to detect and stop known and unknown attacks. FortiGuard Labs has discovered a whopping 890 zero days – more than most competitors combined – with 104 detected so far just in 2020.
Hyperscale and hyperperformance are table stakes in our new digital world, and the new FortiGate 4400F provides these at a price-performance ratio unmatched in the industry. As organizations plan to move aggressively into the next phase of digital innovation, having a high performance security tool such as this in place is essential so that they never have to make the choice, now or in the future, between being competitive and being safe.
Read more about the announcement and how the FortiGate 4400F delivers security for hyperscale data centers with the industry’s best total cost of ownership (TCO).
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