What should IT leaders look for in an SD-WAN solution?

The phrase “game-changing” has become almost overused in recent years, particularly in the world of tech. To an extent, this reflects the degree of constant innovation taking place within the space, and the number of solutions coming to the fore and changing what’s possible within organizations and society. On the flipside, some innovations could be considered tech for tech’s sake, and their ability to be a real game changer is limited.

SD-WAN, however, definitely has game-changing potential – providing the organization has a cloud-first tech strategy. It has opened a whole new world of network speed, agility, and security for such businesses, which so many fast-paced and/or growing firms need right now.

Adapting to hybrid working

Remote working is now a common and permanent practice for many organizations. However, there’s more to remote working than simply staying at home. This flexible working practice can and will see employees coming online from multiple locations, on an intermittent and varied basis. Their places of residence, coffee shops, co-working spaces, hotel rooms, customer sites, and the traditional office environment, will all be “normal” and acceptable places of work, and differing working hours to suit individuals’ personal circumstances will remain common. The days of commuting to one central location, during a defined time period, and connecting to the corporate infrastructure are long gone.

This has the potential to become IT and IT security departments’ worst nightmare. However, if both the network and endpoints are as secure as they need to be – relevant to an organization’s requirements both now and into the future – factors such as employees’ locations, working hours, and the ever-evolving world of work won’t matter.

Security at the heart

In designing or searching for an effective SD-WAN solution, IT leaders must prioritize security. Security cannot be a bolt-on or an afterthought – it must be integral to the solution.

Key to this is bringing network and security policies together.

Traditionally, in the simplest of terms, an IT leader would build a circuit which comes into the corporate network (the office). To provide remote employee access, they’d then build a tunnel to the internet, which feeds into that network via a firewall, so that data can be retrieved. So far, so good.

However, in such a scenario, the company’s network and security solutions are likely to have been supplied by (at least) two providers. Each may have delivered a fantastic service, in respect of what they’ve been contracted to do. But the challenges associated with this disparate provision are growing.

If the performance of an application suddenly drops, for instance, how does the IT professional identify the root cause? The temptation is to simply procure more bandwidth – especially when it’s cheap. But this is just an adhesive bandage. It doesn’t get to the heart of the issue by considering endpoint risks or threats posed by “dirty” traffic, for instance.

SD-WAN solution

With SD-WAN, on the other hand, it’s possible to secure each colleague via a downloadable SaaS license for their device, which protects the endpoint and corporate network, irrespective of location and using only a basic internet service from any provider. The security lies in the architecture of the hardware and software.

Using network firewall or SASE-based cloud services, IT leaders are then empowered by one integrated solution, which delivers rapid cloud connectivity and transparent visibility to each endpoint via a “single pane of glass”. The IT leader therefore gains newfound visibility and control over the entire network, with peace of mind from a security perspective.

With advanced routing and self-healing capabilities, the right SD-WAN solution will also automatically detect the speed, performance, and traffic on the network, understand it, and “fix” itself according to real-time activity. This ability to auto-balance the load dynamically for greater network efficiency will liberate businesses previously shackled by costly, management-intensive VPNs, which are usually made available for a limited number of senior colleagues only.

SD-WAN in action

If an employee is watching Netflix on a company laptop, for instance, SD-WAN will recognize that this is non-work-related traffic which cannot come via the corporate network, and it will be pushed back to the right path – the individual’s home broadband. Normally, the endpoint would have to go to the firewall to determine what to do with the traffic. Here, the security policy on the device knows immediately what to do. If a company operates a BYOD regime, the IT leader can also set policies and workflows with IP, time, or functionality rules, so that the same network security and performance is guaranteed.

In short, endpoint-borne risks such as firewall weaknesses or unsecure home routers will not pose a threat to corporate networks, because access is controlled dynamically by the SD-WAN solution based on colleagues’ real-time security posture. Any potential threats will be instantly flagged to contain incidents as quickly as possible.

Technically complex, operationally effortless

Delivering high performance, affordable SD-WAN solutions is not something everyone can do. For that reason, when an IT leader complains of connectivity speeds, the easier option is for providers to simply recommend more bandwidth. And, with the cost of circuits falling, it’s hard to push back on this apparent resolution.

However, for many businesses, traditional networks will no longer be fit for purpose. We’re not all in the same network anymore, so it’s not a case of routing all the traffic into one place, through a huge firewall, and back out.

The SD-WAN alternative sounds complex, and it really is – we’re talking an intelligent, responsive, end-to-end encrypted network with AI at its heart, after all. However, from the IT leader’s perspective, it is deployed with zero touch provisioning, no hardware installations, and self-configuration for ultimate ease.

IT teams are here to deliver IT services, after all. They don’t want to be held back by infrastructure constraints. It’s about time that tech enabled them to do their jobs.

At-a-glance summary – what should IT leaders look for in SD-WAN?

• Security first
• Zero touch provisioning
• Proven industry performance
• Flexible policies and workflows
• Automated threat response