Vpn
VpnVPN – A cost effective alternative
The need for connectivity to the company network outside of the office has increased dramatically in the past several years. As telecommuting and integration of back offices due to the acquisition of other companies become standard procedure for IT departments, there has never been a greater need for remote access to corporate data, E-mail, and applications.
In the past, it was possible for companies of all sizes to make this type of visibility available to only executives and top sales people using a low end access server, several phone lines and a modem. With these executive and sales types just happy to connect for whatever reason, to copy a file or update a database, there was never a question about speed or the cost of this infrastructure.
As the Internet continues to dominate our personal life and billions of dollars are spent improving the Internet infrastructure so that it can be used to its greatest potential, speed is the name of the game and everybody wants to connect. This presents new and difficult problems for IT departments at companies of all sizes.
How can an IT group build a scalable solution that is generic enough to solve all of these networking issues: access for mobile users, remote site connectivity, E commerce with trading partners and a solid internal structure that leverages investments in infrastructure. Use the Internet. By implementing a Virtual Private Network (VPN), a remote user, site or trading partner can connect to another network through the existing Internet infrastructure. (Figure A)
Using a combination of tunneling, encryption and access controls, VPNs allow users to connect securely to a corporate server located on a corporate LAN using the routing infrastructure provided by a public internetwork (such as the Internet). Connection to the Internet can be made by using any combination of access technologies including T1, frame relay, ISDN, ATM or dial access. To the user, the connection between his workstation and the server appears as if data is being sent over a private connection.
When it comes to remote-access for mobile users, the idea is for them to gain access to the corporate network using the Internet. Typically, a user would hook up to the web by dialing into his local internet provider and tunneling through the web back to the home office. They would then go through whatever security has been established to gain access to corporate resources. This is very simple compared to the traditional dial-up method, where users dial a local access number or an 800 number is forwarded to a local number, and calls are terminated on a bank of modems or an access server connected to the network. Not only is the architechiture simple, but much cheaper in a lot of ways.
It is possible to eliminate long distance access fees and replace...
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