Skyrocketing VPN Usage - Experts Input | Information Security Buzz

With the spread of the Coronavirus and people working from home, there has been a 53% spike in Virtual Private Network (VPN) usage in the US and a significant increase from around the world according to Atlas VPN.

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Justin Jett

March 19, 2020

Director of Audit and Compliance

Plixer

Organizations that are building out their VPN capabilities need to be sure to properly deploy and patch their systems.

As the number of employees working from home continues to rise, businesses must ensure that their VPN is in a position to offer their employees the same experience as though they were working in the office. Bandwidth can be a serious strain for businesses not used to a majority of their users connecting from home. IT must be sure to educate their users, so they are aware of the impact on everyone and to limit their bandwidth-heavy activity, like Netflix streaming, to outside of office hours. This will ensure that productivity doesn’t drop and that users don’t try to forgo the VPN altogether, which could have dire consequences for the security of the business. Organizations that are building out their VPN capabilities need to be sure to properly deploy and patch their systems to prevent vulnerabilities from opening up their corporate network to malicious actors. By taking advantage of network traffic metadata, businesses can measure user experience over the VPN, detect malicious activity, and maintain visibility even when employees are no longer in the physical office. Read Less

Tal Zamir

March 19, 2020

Founder and CTO

Hysolate

The more users are working from home, the greater the risk.

A Virtual Private Network (VPN) might give employees (and organizations) a false sense of security. A VPN only secures the communication channel between the employee's workstation and the corporate network. However, as a massive amount of home workers now start to use their personal workstations to access corporate assets, it's only a matter of time until we see a soaring number of cyberattacks that originate from these personal devices that can be easily breached. If devices are infected with malware, even workers who use a VPN client cannot evade attackers who can ride their VPN connection to raise havoc in enterprise networks. The more users are working from home, the greater the risk. Organizations should instruct employees to use trusted dedicated workstations to access sensitive corporate assets and avoid using their multi-purpose personal devices. Read Less