The edge is becoming vital as enterprises run workloads across increasingly dispersed locations. Safeguarding the edge is essential to protect sensitive data, ensure uninterrupted operations, and mitigate potential risks. To deliver consistent security across edge locations, applications, users, and devices, VMware and Symantec by Broadcom are teaming up to deliver an integrated solution for Secure Access Service Edge (SASE). VMware is extending its Security Service Edge (SSE) orchestration integration to include Symantec Enterprise Cloud. This new integration and planned evolution will bring down barriers to SASE adoption with additional best-in-class networking and security capabilities.
Distributed resources pose networking and security challenges
Enterprises today operate in a distributed environment where applications can reside anywhere: data center, public cloud, at the edge, or sourced directly from SaaS vendors. Users access these applications from anywhere as well: in the office, at home, or on-the-go. These transformations have increased operational complexities, challenging enterprise IT teams on both the networking and security fronts. Each user’s application experience is subject to local network conditions. People want seamless access to their applications without fear of reaching a malicious site or downloading a virus-laden file.
At the same time, a distributed enterprise architecture can significantly increase the points of entry for a breach. IT must ensure that employees, partners, and contractors stay productive while simultaneously keeping both users and the IT infrastructure secure.
To address these requirements, enterprises are transforming their networking and security infrastructure by adopting SASE architectures comprised of SD-WAN and SSE solutions. This combined solution delivers superior network performance without compromising security, while simplifying operations and management.
Bringing connectivity and security leadership together
VMware SD-WAN is recognized as a leader, deployed at more than 600,000 sites across 180 countries and many industry verticals. It connects branch and remote users to cloud and data center applications in a reliable, efficient, and optimal manner. Symantec Enterprise Cloud is the leading enterprise-grade cloud security solution deployed by thousands of customers—including the top global financial services firms, leading world-wide telecommunications providers, and largest and most recognized automobile manufacturers.
Accelerating SASE adoption for VMware and Symantec customers
VMware SD-WAN simplifies network connectivity and policy management while offering path optimization and superior network performance for a consistent user experience. It uses a global network of 200+ VMware Edge PoPs from VMware and our partners to connect users to the nearest Symantec Cloud location, placing traffic on an optimal path between users and their applications.
Symantec Enterprise Cloud provides proactive network security capabilities delivered as a resilient and high-performing cloud security service. Sitting between employees, wherever they are located, and the Internet, the service protects the enterprise from advanced threats, controls and protects corporate use of cloud applications and the web, prevents data leaks, and ensures compliance with all company information and web or cloud access policies.
Critical benefits to enterprise-class customers include management flexibility to enforce internet access by device, user, app, and location; detection and blocking of malware hidden in encrypted traffic, applying real-time threat intelligence, risk-level ratings, deep file inspection and sandboxing; and blocking of threats with Symantec’s innovative web isolation technology.
The joint solution is currently in tech preview with a planned release in the first quarter of next year.
Benefits of the joint VMware-Symantec SASE solution
The integrated SASE architecture offers the following benefits to customers:
Enhanced user experience: For a typical enterprise with multiple branch offices and many remote workers accessing applications, local conditions on WAN links can directly impact productivity—for example, long download delays or poor video call quality. Configuring policies to handle these network conditions on a site-by-site basis for each application is too burdensome for IT teams. VMware SD-WAN can automatically recognize over 4300 applications and ensure the correct treatment depending on local last-mile conditions. VMware SD-WAN can also dynamically remediate problems at each location without IT intervention. This automatic recognition and optimization greatly simplifies installation, configuration, and operational overhead of network connectivity.
Comprehensive threat detection and response: The solution makes it easy for enterprises to hand off the traffic to the nearest Symantec security enforcement points on the optimal path between users and their applications. For enterprise-class customers, critical benefits of Symantec include management flexibility to enforce internet access by device, user, app, and location. Symantec can detect and block malware hidden in encrypted traffic, applying real-time threat intelligence, risk-level ratings, deep file inspection, and sandboxing. Symantec’s innovative web isolation technology can block sophisticated and targeted web threats.
Automation and deployment options: An enterprise can leverage the VMware SASE fabric to connect all branches to the nearest Symantec SASE cloud location via VMware Edge POPs. With this approach, the solution automatically handles underlying network performance and path optimization needs before directing traffic to Symantec for security enforcement. Customers get network performance and security without trading one benefit for another. Enterprises may alternately choose a policy to directly forward Internet-bound traffic from branch locations to the nearest Symantec cloud location, driven by existing deployment needs.
Traffic recognition and steering: VMware application mapping provides seamless integration for existing customers that also use Symantec’s ZTNA solution. The solution can detect devices with the Symantec agent and use bypass policies to place traffic from these devices on the right path for better performance while maintaining security. Symantec agents are typically deployed on user devices to access the nearest Symantec SASE location in the absence of a corporate network. Bypass policies for network traffic redirection can be configured centrally on the VMware Edge Cloud Orchestrator™ and deployed across hundreds or thousands of branch edges, eliminating the complexity of managing these policies site by site.
Simplified management: The integrated solution from VMware and Symantec is cloud-delivered, reducing the burden for IT when it comes to designing and deploying the solution for scale, high availability, and lifecycle management. VMware uses the centralized VMware Edge Cloud Orchestrator to manage all the branch connectivity. Policies are configured centrally on the orchestrator and pushed to all branch sites, reducing the risk of human errors, and helping manage change windows and CAB approvals.
Streamlined, AI-enabled operations: The solution avoids the need to manually create tunnels every time a new branch is onboarded and simplifies the management of site connectivity. VMware Edge Cloud Orchestrator provides IT with visibility into the quality of experience for users at each location. VMware SASE uses AIOps to offer visual evidence of user experience, for end user devices as well as IoT devices, when these devices access applications. Symantec recently introduced SymantecAI, an advanced suite of security and productivity solutions powered by AI technologies that increases security by simplifying the analysis and remediation of threats, ensuring better data protection, and streamlining security operations.
Working together VMware and Symantec, both leaders in WAN edge and cloud security solutions, provide the broadest set of SASE deployment options for a complete SASE solution with protection for the distributed edge, improved user experience, simplified management, and better performance and scale with an agile security posture. This powerful combination of connectivity and security will empower organizations to unlock new levels of productivity and drive transformative outcomes.
