Alternative Private Backbones for SASE and SD-WAN
Part of the premise behind secure access service edge (SASE) and global SD-WAN services is to replace the MPLS services that long anchored enterprise networks. But to do that, they first need ways to overcome the unpredictable and high latencies of the global Internet. Enter global private backbones. Whether they’re independent backbones, like Azure Virtual […]
Resilience a Must in Evaluating SASE Deployment
We’ve spoken a lot about the capabilities of SASE like Zero Trust and security in general, but features mean little if there’s a SASE outage. Today, all SASE vendors provide high availability (HA) SD-WAN device configurations, but, of course, SASE networks involve more than just SD-WAN devices. They involve a full range of security services, […]
Ten SASE Trends To Look For In 2021
Another year, another era. 2020 was a year like none other for IT. The biggest exercise in remote working ever seen in the COVID-19 response. The worst hack in the SolarWinds attack. And, yes, the evolution of a new network architecture called SASE. What does 2021 have in store for the SASE market? Based on […]
The Pleasure and Pain of Best of Breed Networks
Ever since the early days of networking, we’ve extolled the benefits of best-of-breed networks. We’ve been able to select products with the most features, expanded our purchasing options, and seen prices plunge. But like anything, there are also downsides to building networks from a mix of products and services, downsides that became particularly relevant as […]
SASE: Five Networking Questions to Ask Palo Alto and Every Other Security Vendor Offering a SASE Solution
We’ve seen quite a few vendors claiming to offer secure access service edge (SASE) solutions since Gartner first introduced the architecture to the market last fall. Some vendors have come from the networking space but many of the biggest companies — Netskope, Palo Alto, and Zscaler — have their roots in security. With SD-WAN firms, […]
SD-WAN, or SASE: Focus on the Biggest Picture
All too often, when our team gets called into an engagement, we spend time helping our client anticipating their networking and security needs of tomorrow. Too often, the IT leaders are focussed on one thing when it comes to SD-WAN — getting off of MPLS. The cost savings of replacing MPLS circuits with SD-WAN and Internet bandwidth have […]