VPN: Make Your Computer Network Available, Anytime, Anywhere, Securely

Every business wants to save time and money in providing its products or services to its customers. As a result, many businesses have put computer systems in place to help achieve these goals. However, often these systems are available only in the office. Imagine the potential benefits if you could extend your computer network to virtually anywhere.

Have you ever experienced the following?

A valued client calls at 4:55pm and asks for the proposal you’ve been developing for them by 9:00am tomorrow morning. You’re on the way out the door to your daughter’s soccer game. What do you do?
1. Scramble around for a disk to copy the files to a floppy disk to take home, pray that you got everything you needed, and show up late to the game to find you just missed your daughter scoring her first goal.
2. Stay at work, finish the proposal, and miss the soccer game completely.
3. Leave knowing that you have complete access to your company’s computer network from home. You go to your daughter’s soccer game and after the kids have gone to bed, you complete the proposal, send it to the customer that night, allowing you to close the deal the next morning at 9:30am after they have reviewed your proposal.

If your business has extended its network by implementing a virtual private network—a VPN—then you can rest easy knowing that you’re going to opt for seeing that soccer game and getting the job done at your convenience.

What is a VPN?

So, what is a VPN? A network is a collection of computers that can communicate with each other. Most businesses today have a network within their office as well as some type of connection to the Internet. A VPN allows the connection to the Internet to be used to create a private restricted communications link between one or more computers that are physically located elsewhere on the Internet. The remote computers could be used by a remote sales force, a key employee working from home or a small branch office that you’ve just opened. The communication between the two locations using the Internet is a virtual private network.

Benefits of a VPN

By implementing a VPN, your business can:

• Increase response time and productivity by allowing an employee access to business resources from anywhere.
• Increase employee morale by giving them the flexibility to get the job done while at the same time balance their personal lives.
• Save money by taking advantage of a publicly shared resources, the Internet.

VPN Considerations

There are many ways to technically implement a VPN. Three important considerations when selecting a solution:

1. What do your employees need to access? Some possibilities include: Business applications such as customer databases, accounting programs, project management software, simple word processing documents, email, spreadsheets and more.
2. How is the main office connected to the Internet? How is the remote office or user connected to the Internet? Many business offices have DSL or T1 Internet access. Individual remote users are typically using DSL, cable Internet or dial-up. The type of Internet access at both ends is going to impact the technical solutions available.
3. What level of security should be implemented? Every business should carefully consider its computer security. Nearly every business has some information that merits protection, be it employee names, addresses, social security information, salary information, client lists, credit information or proprietary product or service information. Some businesses have remote access to their computer systems but have not considered security. It’s important to notice it’s called a “VPN”, not a “VN” – the “P” for private is a key component because security is built-in to the solution.

This article does not fully discuss all aspects of selecting or implementing a VPN solution for your business. There are numerous informational resources available on the Internet by manufacturers such as Symantec, Sonicwall, Cisco and so on, or ask Veraciti for more information. By implementing a well-planned VPN solution, your company can extend the benefits of your computer network to help your business grow.