Is Your Customer DNS Ready for the Remote Work Reality?
July 27, 2020
The global pandemic has created a highly distributed, yet extremely vulnerable, remote working environment that’s challenging channel partners to take action and drive change with DNS.
By Sandy Janes, Senior Director, Channel Sales, Infoblox
The coronavirus outbreak changed the way companies work overnight as businesses sought to minimize in-person interactions in a collective attempt to slow the spread of the virus. Companies scrambled to deploy technologies that would connect and secure workers in the home workspace.
This dramatic difference in how and where people work created a range of new opportunities for partners stemming from the accelerated move to cloud solutions for back-end infrastructure — to ensure, for example, reliable connectivity — and front-end collaboration tools like Office 365. Simultaneously, the move created several security challenges for channel partners and their customers, including the difficulties of remote management, a lack of multi-factor authentication, and an increase in cyberattacks.
With market research firms including Gartner predicting that nearly 75% of all companies will move at least 5% of their previously on-site workforce to permanently remote positions as a result of the COVID-19 shutdown, channel partners play a strategic role in helping customers enable work in the more dispersed enterprise. On the security side, phishing attacks have spiked 600% this year. With their ecosystem of cybersecurity vendor relationships, channel partners can help lead a strategy to protect corporate assets from falling victim now and in the future.
Why DNS Security Is More Vital Than Ever Before
When employees work outside the office, the corporate firewall no longer offers adequate protection. As workers rely more on cloud-based collaboration tools, the majority of traffic moves outside the reach of traditional security solutions that were designed to protect a clearly defined perimeter. VPN, touted to enable secure access to corporate applications from remote destinations, can do only so much in this environment.
Channel partners, including MSPs and solution providers, can help their customers mitigate remote security challenges by leveraging DNS (Domain Name System) for foundational security since it sits at the network’s core.
All DNS Services Aren’t Created Equal
According to a recent report from Heavy Reading, which surveyed communications service providers (CSPs) of various types and sizes throughout the world, 66% of respondents believe DNS is critical for delivering security services in the cloud. It’s also vital to 5G adoption (71%) and even multi-access edge computing (MEC) adoption (63%). Despite these survey confirmations, only a small percentage of CSPs (less than 16%) believe their DNS is “capable today” of supporting MEC or 5G NGC (next-generation core) networks.
To ensure that a customer’s network is both secure and able to take advantage of the benefits of these next-generation network technologies, channel partners should do their due diligence and identify a DNS service provider that offers the following:
> Visibility: One of DNS’ most powerful features is its ability to provide a window into what devices are connected to a network and where they’re sending their network traffic. A DNS service provider should make this information easily and clearly accessible so that network managers can quickly identify who’s connecting to the network — even in today’s distributed computing world.
> Scalability at the Network Edge: Network managers have been challenged by the sharp rise in the number of remote workers seeking to access mission-critical services and applications from outside the network. A DNS solution should be able to provide access to these services flexibly, seamlessly, and with low latency so employees can get their work done with minimum interruption, no matter where they’re located.
> Security Stack Integration: The information provided by DNS is a critical tool in threat intelligence and response, but it’s only useful if it gets to the right person or security application. It’s important that a DNS service provider can share threat intelligence across the security stack, enabling it to detect and block dangerous requests and connections before they burrow into corporate assets. This frees up IT staff to focus on strategic initiatives and less routine threats.
> Automation: The sheer number of users seeking to access networks remotely, as well as the sharp rise in cyberthreats caused by the pandemic, will quickly overwhelm efforts to manually provide network and security services. DNS service providers that automate at scale for service provisioning, threat investigation and response, and other processes will simplify IT teams’ work and stretch budgets further. Additionally, automating service provisioning will become increasingly important as large-scale, distributed network technologies like MEC, 5G NR, and 5G NGC become more prevalent. A DNS provider should support the high levels of automation required by these technologies and have a road map in place to keep up with these next-generation networks.
> Next-Generation Network Experience: To get the most out of their DNS investments, customers need to integrate its two sibling technologies that together form DDI, the nerve center of the core network. Combining DNS with Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) and IP Address Management (IPAM) enables customers to address the challenges of provisioning vast numbers of IP addresses across diverse physical and virtual infrastructure and public and private cloud environments. Partners should pick a reputable vendor that offers a DDI solution that can deploy on-premises or in hybrid environments to cover customers wherever their people work.
DNS is already a critical part of customers’ networks and can be a powerful tool in helping them prepare for the distributed work environments of the future. Giving them the tools to ask the right questions about DNS and its capabilities could prove to be a critical move that benefits them — and partners — in the long run.
This dramatic difference in how and where people work created a range of new opportunities for partners stemming from the accelerated move to cloud solutions for back-end infrastructure — to ensure, for example, reliable connectivity — and front-end collaboration tools like Office 365. Simultaneously, the move created several security challenges for channel partners and their customers, including the difficulties of remote management, a lack of multi-factor authentication, and an increase in cyberattacks.
With market research firms including Gartner predicting that nearly 75% of all companies will move at least 5% of their previously on-site workforce to permanently remote positions as a result of the COVID-19 shutdown, channel partners play a strategic role in helping customers enable work in the more dispersed enterprise. On the security side, phishing attacks have spiked 600% this year. With their ecosystem of cybersecurity vendor relationships, channel partners can help lead a strategy to protect corporate assets from falling victim now and in the future.
Why DNS Security Is More Vital Than Ever Before
When employees work outside the office, the corporate firewall no longer offers adequate protection. As workers rely more on cloud-based collaboration tools, the majority of traffic moves outside the reach of traditional security solutions that were designed to protect a clearly defined perimeter. VPN, touted to enable secure access to corporate applications from remote destinations, can do only so much in this environment.
Channel partners, including MSPs and solution providers, can help their customers mitigate remote security challenges by leveraging DNS (Domain Name System) for foundational security since it sits at the network’s core.
All DNS Services Aren’t Created Equal
According to a recent report from Heavy Reading, which surveyed communications service providers (CSPs) of various types and sizes throughout the world, 66% of respondents believe DNS is critical for delivering security services in the cloud. It’s also vital to 5G adoption (71%) and even multi-access edge computing (MEC) adoption (63%). Despite these survey confirmations, only a small percentage of CSPs (less than 16%) believe their DNS is “capable today” of supporting MEC or 5G NGC (next-generation core) networks.
To ensure that a customer’s network is both secure and able to take advantage of the benefits of these next-generation network technologies, channel partners should do their due diligence and identify a DNS service provider that offers the following:
> Visibility: One of DNS’ most powerful features is its ability to provide a window into what devices are connected to a network and where they’re sending their network traffic. A DNS service provider should make this information easily and clearly accessible so that network managers can quickly identify who’s connecting to the network — even in today’s distributed computing world.
> Scalability at the Network Edge: Network managers have been challenged by the sharp rise in the number of remote workers seeking to access mission-critical services and applications from outside the network. A DNS solution should be able to provide access to these services flexibly, seamlessly, and with low latency so employees can get their work done with minimum interruption, no matter where they’re located.
> Security Stack Integration: The information provided by DNS is a critical tool in threat intelligence and response, but it’s only useful if it gets to the right person or security application. It’s important that a DNS service provider can share threat intelligence across the security stack, enabling it to detect and block dangerous requests and connections before they burrow into corporate assets. This frees up IT staff to focus on strategic initiatives and less routine threats.
> Automation: The sheer number of users seeking to access networks remotely, as well as the sharp rise in cyberthreats caused by the pandemic, will quickly overwhelm efforts to manually provide network and security services. DNS service providers that automate at scale for service provisioning, threat investigation and response, and other processes will simplify IT teams’ work and stretch budgets further. Additionally, automating service provisioning will become increasingly important as large-scale, distributed network technologies like MEC, 5G NR, and 5G NGC become more prevalent. A DNS provider should support the high levels of automation required by these technologies and have a road map in place to keep up with these next-generation networks.
> Next-Generation Network Experience: To get the most out of their DNS investments, customers need to integrate its two sibling technologies that together form DDI, the nerve center of the core network. Combining DNS with Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) and IP Address Management (IPAM) enables customers to address the challenges of provisioning vast numbers of IP addresses across diverse physical and virtual infrastructure and public and private cloud environments. Partners should pick a reputable vendor that offers a DDI solution that can deploy on-premises or in hybrid environments to cover customers wherever their people work.
DNS is already a critical part of customers’ networks and can be a powerful tool in helping them prepare for the distributed work environments of the future. Giving them the tools to ask the right questions about DNS and its capabilities could prove to be a critical move that benefits them — and partners — in the long run.
