Designing Access Controls

Make Decisions about Remote Access (VPN)

Table 3-24. Advantages of Remote Access

Advantages

Explanation

Increased productivity

Users can access data and perform work

 

tasks when out of the office

Increased employee satisfaction

Some users may be able to work more flexible

 

hours or telecommute from home. Others

 

escape the frustration of a long commute;

 

they can focus on work rather than on

 

traveling to the office.

Benefits to the environment

Telecommuting decreases traffic congestion,

 

pollution, and fossil fuel consumption. You

 

might even find government programs that

 

offer incentives for companies that

 

encourage telecommuting.

 

 

 

Select VPN Options

 

After you decide to establish a VPN, you must start designing your deploy-

 

ment. Deploying a VPN can be a bit complicated. You have a lot of choices to

 

make—from the type of VPN gateway to the exact encryption algorithms used

 

to protect data. This guide focuses on the decisions with the greatest implica-

 

tions on deployment; examining every detail of VPN security policies is

 

beyond its scope.

 

One important choice is your VPN protocol. Common ones include:

 

■ IP Security (IPsec) with Internet Key Exchange (IKE)

 

■ Point-to-point Tunneling Protocol (PPTP)

 

■ Layer 2 Tunneling Protocol (L2TP)/IPsec

 

 

N o t e

Although L2TP can be implemented without IPsec, it does not provide ade-

 

quate security on its own. Therefore, this guide will consider only the L2TP/

 

IPsec implementation.

 

 

In addition to selecting the VPN protocol, you need to choose various options for the selected protocol:

■Authentication method—options include:

•Digital certificate

•Password (preshared key)

■Encryption protocols and algorithms, which ensure data privacy (encryp- tion) and data integrity (hash or authentication)

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