By Suzana Evolution of Remote Access Technology
In the past 2 decades the Remote Access technology has evolved many times to its perfection. Almost all companies and corporation now heavily rely on Virtual Private Networks (VPN) and the use of PC remote access for remotely accessing their VPN when outside their premises. Employees however are blessed with this technology as they can now work even at home without having to be at the office to use the VPN.
However the use of this kind of software to access its VPN can burn a hole in the pockets due to the ever increasing prices and security concerns. A recent report by Infonetics showed that the VPN security market grew 11% this year and is expected to reach $6.6 billion by the year 2015. With interests shifting from just remote access to ‘secure remote access’, the remote access industry has had many innovative changes to help in the evolution of this technology and its uses.
In over 20 years the evolution is going steady. Starting from a humble use by using a network of private modem pooled together via dial up connection and then followed by the use of internet IP protocols to navigate between the VPN & clients. Today the change has made is possible to access VPNs without needing to download and install special client software on the PC. This is quite convenient as it allows complete access from anywhere including smart phones by utilizing SSL, SSLv3 & the new player in the industry TLSv1 (Transport layer security). The use of TLS & DTLS has helped in balancing endpoint limitations and reducing risks against each user and the application. While these new security features may not mean much to home users of Remote Desktop Software, they are extremely useful for corporations that are active in industries where secure access to company data is a priority.
The constant changes have its added disadvantages as well, since there are now hundreds of different PC remote access tools that are available in the market. Currently product selection involves SSL VPN tools to support secure web portal access to an application from limited endpoints. Better proxy access to common clients from many endpoints, secure port forwarding via java or ActiveX and network tunnels from endpoints with Installed TLS VPN clients are also used in certain software solutions. Therefore, before you make a decision as to which solution will be the best one for your company, you truly need to take the time to analyze your needs both in terms of what kind of access will be required (web based, PC applications, mobile applications, etc.) and the type of security mechanisms that you will need.
