Unified SASE takes network security and connectivity to the next level

Imagine you’re the IT manager at a fast-growing international manufacturer with facilities in several countries. Your company has shifted permanently to a hybrid work model, and employees are using several cloud platforms to access critical resources, from home and on the road.  

At the same time, a growing number of edge-computing devices are being deployed at your factories to help with quality control and inventory management.

In this complex, dynamic environment, your security setup — a mix of virtual private networks (VPNs), firewalls and other tools — is a headache. It’s slow, inconsistent and riddled with blind spots, leaving your colleagues frustrated and vulnerable to cyberthreats.

What you need is control over your network and security, at the same time and in real time. And this is where unified secure access service edge (SASE) comes into play.

What is unified SASE?

Unified SASE combines connectivity and security into one cloud-native platform to address challenges across cloud environments, remote work setups and edge devices. It’s a game changer for organizations that are trying to navigate complex IT infrastructure.

In the past, network security has revolved around protecting a clearly defined perimeter: think corporate firewalls and on-premises servers. However, the rise of remote work, IoT devices and multicloud strategies has blurred these boundaries.

Traditional security models tend to have blind spots, which means threats can go undetected. Disparate and unconnected security tools create silos, leading to inefficiencies and potential vulnerabilities. It’s also difficult to enforce security policies across different environments.

To address these challenges, unified SASE merges two core components into one seamless platform:

• Networking: Software-defined wide area network (SD-WAN) for optimal connectivity across locations
• Security services: Secure web gateways, cloud access security brokers and zero trust network access (ZTNA) for robust protection

How is unified SASE different from traditional SASE?

Traditional SASE may involve working with multiple vendors and loosely integrated tools. But with unified SASE, you deal with a single vendor. This can be more cost-efficient and help you streamline your operations through centralized management.

Unified SASE also means a deeper integration of your networking and security capabilities, making it easier to protect digital resources and applications, no matter where employees access them from. NTT DATA’s Managed Campus Networks with Palo Alto Networks Prisma SASE for example, is a fully managed, integrated networking and security solution to support our clients’ digital transformation and hybrid-work strategies.

• ALSO READ → To unlock employee productivity securely, make the shift to SASE

How unified SASE solves network and security gaps

Unified SASE is designed to address the critical gaps created by traditional network security approaches. Here’s how:

• Seamless connectivity: Whether at the edge, in the cloud or on-premises, unified SASE maintains uninterrupted connections.
• Real-time threat detection: It uses integrated tools to instantly identify and mitigate security threats on your network.
• Centralized management: A single dashboard simplifies policy enforcement and enables rapid reaction to evolving threats.
• Better visibility: It offers a comprehensive view of your network activity, reducing blind spots and improving your overall security posture.

AI and machine learning play a critical role in strengthening these capabilities.

AI can sift through large volumes of data to identify anomalies and potential threats in real time, while automated policy enforcement means security adjustments are made dynamically and without manual intervention.

AI also improves network efficiency by predicting and adapting to traffic patterns on the go, while AI-enabled analytics can flag unusual login attempts or detect unauthorized access to sensitive cloud-native resources.

• ALSO READ → AIOps complements platform-oriented security for unrivaled peace of mind

How unified SASE makes a difference in your organization

For our anxious IT manager working for a global manufacturer, unified SASE solves several problems.

First, even traditional virtual private networks couldn’t deliver the low latency and consistent security that employees needed. With unified SASE, ZTNA provides secure, direct-to-cloud access without sacrificing performance.

Managing connectivity and security across multiple cloud platforms becomes less daunting, as unified SASE enforces policies consistently while maintaining connectivity. You can therefore securely and reliably scale your network as your operations grow.

And on the factory floor, unified SASE ensures data privacy for edge devices, which gather and process various types of sensitive data.

What comes next for unified SASE?

The evolution of unified SASE is set to accelerate as increasingly advanced AI is integrated into the platform. For example, more sophisticated algorithms will make proactive threat detection and network optimization faster and ever more accurate.

At the same time, automated responses to security incidents will become more precise and reliable as the platform learns from previous experiences, reducing the need for human intervention.

Adopting a unified SASE strategy will prepare your organization to meet the next wave of network and security challenges head-on, and working with a managed service provider like NTT DATA is the best way to achieve this.

Our expertise and resources add substantial value in helping our clients realize the full benefits of unified SASE, all the way from the consulting phase to the design, build, deployment, operationalization and optimization stages.

Let us make unified SASE the cornerstone of your IT strategy.