How a Smart Energy Leader Ensures Secure Access to Over 150 Systems for Over 2000 Diverse Users

Secure Remote Connectivity to Leverage Productivity

A global leader in the field of smart energy was looking for a better secure remote access solution to provide access to a sensitive and internal application and to replace the existing virtual private network (VPN). It was crucial that the new solution would ensure access for employees as well as third-parties, all without exposing the network and its assets to risk.

To improve productivity and more effectively leverage their remote workforce, the company wanted to enable their customer service and sales teams to securely access the internal application from anywhere, using any device — including unmanaged devices.

The required secure access solution had to include encryption, to address privacy concerns, and to ensure easy implementation with minimal impact on users and business operations.

Encrypted, Secure, Seamless Access for All — From Any Device

Cyolo was ultimately chosen to provide the company’s mobile and remote workforce with safe and secure access to sensitive and internal applications, replacing its existing VPN. Following a 10 minute implementation and configuration process, the internal application system was published through the Cyolo broker, enabling access for every approved user without exposing the organizational network.

Balancing between security and user experience is always a challenge, and Cyolo was designed to ensure smooth self-service user enrollment and user login. Cyolo’s solution was fully integrated with the company’s active directory, which automatically set the access authorizations. In addition, Cyolo's multi-factor authentication (MFA) was set, and during onboarding, users are prompted with an MFA requirement. Once done, access is granted with a smooth single-sign-on (SSO) process.

To ensure secure external access, Cyolo added a protection layer that prevents malicious actors from exploiting the system's vulnerabilities and accessing data, and reduces the risk of cyber-attacks. Cyolo’s zero-trust secure access is based on the user ID and the device ID, and evaluates other factors that provide context to ensure dynamic, risk- based, accurate access. Cyolo ensures security, agility and productivity, without compromising business needs and without imposing on the users. Cyolo provides end-to-end encryption and at no stage is any data visible, or stored on Cyolo's cloud broker. All the sensitive data remains secure within the enterprise network. In addition, Cyolo provided unique privileged access management (PAM) rights to the company's administrators, while ensuring the organization data and sensitive assets safe, even in a case of a compromised admin account.

Then Came COVID-19

The successful implementation of Cyolo’s secure access solution and the impact of COVID-19 on business operations, led to the expansion of Cyolo’s solution in the organization. As more and more employees, partners and suppliers were sent to work from home, the company decided to use Cyolo to ensure secure remote access, using unmanaged devices, without giving access to the network and risking sensitive assets.