Remote Users Take a NAP
Do you miss the old days, the days where you went to work at 9, took an hour at lunch and then headed home to the fam at 5?
With computers, some of us go to work at 9, take an hour at lunch, and then head home to do more work at 5. Travel, telecommuting, and working nights and weekends at home also lays a new burden on IT. You all have to securely give all these stiffs secure access to corporate computers (and by safe I mean safe for the corporation). Access must be secure with no data leakage and corporate machines must be protected from personal PC-borne viruses.
Virtualization and remote control take care of all of this. The PC is simply displaying (and not really running) corporate apps.
Microsoft has a few other methods. If you use Windows Server 2008, Network Access Protection (NASP) will make sure remote machines comply with your organization's security policies, virus definitions are up to date and protections such as firewalls are in place.
Windows 8 will go a step further. Here you can install the OS on a USB drive, which remote machines can boot off of. This way the OS can be configured securely and the remote session can proceed safely.
I have two questions: How has your work week changed with home computers, smart phones, laptops, netbook and tablets? And how does your company deal with remote access? Answers and explanations welcome at [email protected].
Posted by Doug Barney on 01/06/2012 at 1:19 PM