Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) have become very popular in recent years, especially since the pandemic resulted in remote working across all industries. Businesses need to ensure that their company databases and sensitive information remains safe and secure, even as employees work from home. However, working outside the office has caused some security issues for businesses. VPNs have helped remote workers a lot to avoid such issues. Regardless of whether your business has remote working employees or not, it can benefit from a robust and secure VPN. Let’s discuss why you need a secure VPN. This information will help you better understand its security features and business benefits.
But first…
What Is a VPN?
VPN is short for virtual private networks, and it is a security software tool designed to make your Internet or network connection safer. Typically, it can be installed as an app on your mobile devices like laptops and smartphones or as a browser plug-in.
VPNs simply encrypt the data transmissions from a device, including web traffic, sensitive data, passwords, emails, financial information, and personal information.
How Do VPNs Work?
While the technical details and features differ with VPN providers, the main purpose of a VPN is to establish a safe and secure connection between your device and the Internet. It does this by masking your device’s IP address and rerouting all your data transmissions through a VPN host server.
The data is encrypted to ensure no external party can access the information being transmitted to and from your device. Data encryption is made possible with the use of an encrypted tunnel between your device and the Internet.
VPNs help maintain privacy and security by hiding your online identity (IP address) and online information exchange (encrypted data transmissions).
Why You Need Secure VPN
With time, more businesses are becoming victim to cyber attacks and security breaches, most resulting from human error. Cybercriminals and hackers develop new ways to attack business networks and manipulate employees for restricted access and sensitive business data.
As more employees started leaving their offices and working from home and other remote locations, things became easier for cybercriminals and hackers. They can gain access without the need to breach secure business networks.
They could simply hack the weaker home/public networks and devices of remote employees to gain access to sensitive business data. Remote work effectively increased the risk of business data leaks through weak, unprotected network connections since employees exchanged business data remotely.
Businesses needed to make remote work safe to protect their businesses. They had to secure the traffic between their corporate network, the Internet, and the home and public networks of employees. Part of the solution for these issues is deploying the use of safe and secure VPN connections.
While many smaller businesses opt for individual VPNs for employees, other larger corporate entities started using VPNs for business, typically offering more functionality.
The premium features of a corporate VPN or VPN for business include centralized administration for central control and the ability to add users. Businesses can also create multiple encrypted tunnels for specific applications like their emails and databases, and they can safely connect remote employees and offices to their business network.
Such benefits and more necessitate a secure VPN, especially for businesses with remote employees that exchange sensitive business data.
● To Prevent Cyber Attacks
The ability of VPNs to create an encrypted tunnel for data transmissions is crucial for businesses. It ensures that the exchanged data is meaningless to external parties without secure encryption keys. The tunnel ensures that no prying eyes are intercepting the exchange of data.
VPNs provide protection from all external parties, including cybercriminals, hackers, and even the user’s Internet Service Provider (ISP). This technique prevents malicious activities and cyber attacks like cookie theft, man-in-the-middle attacks, and phishing, especially when remote employees use public networks.
It also protects business data exchange when employees accidentally connect to fake public networks, which are designed by cybercriminals to steal sensitive information from unknowing users. A secure VPN ensures their online data transmissions remain safe from external parties irrespective of their location.
With VPNs, employees’ personal information, credentials, passwords, bank details, emails, documents, and other such sensitive data remains safe from prying eyes. On the other hand, not using a secure VPN can easily result in the interception, access, theft, modification, and exploitation of all sensitive information.
● For Remote Security
When your remote working employees are outside the office, they are not protected by the cyber security measures of your office. In this scenario, a remote access VPN can offer an extra layer of security over traditional ones to protect their access to company databases and servers.
A secure VPN provides remote employees safe access to your business’s network so they can access in-house databases, servers, sensitive information and share resources safely when required.
Moreover, the VPN offers another layer of access control, which securely validates employee access to your business network. Remote employees require additional login credentials to validate themselves and gain access to your business network and resources.
Access can also be restricted depending on a grading system that allocates the correct level of employee access based on your employee’s username, IP address, or credentials.
Simply put, a secure VPN can add a perimeter to the existing one to ensure your in-house sensitive business data and resources always remain protected, even when accessed by employees.
● For Reliable Privacy
Secure VPNs can mask your original IP address and provide an anonymous one instead. So, when your employees use the VPN for business operations, any online activity associated with their IP address will become anonymous and cannot be connected to the employee or your business.
Still, companies that use corporate VPNs may be subject to audits of the websites visited by their employees.
Conclusion
We live in the information age, where data is arguably the most important asset of any business. With a secure VPN, you can protect your sensitive business data against rampant cyber crime and accidental data leaks.
VPN for business also offers immense control over your business network, database, servers, and access. However, it isn’t always easy to pick the right VPN best suited for your business.
Therefore, we highly recommend consulting the expert professionals at Communications Solutions Inc. in Jacksonville, Florida, for all your company’s business network and VPN needs.
They can guide you better on corporate VPNs, which ones to choose, how to set them up, and protect your business data, resources, and remote employees the right way.
Please Contact Us today to learn more about why you need a secure VPN or deploy a secure VPN and business network for your company.