Secure telework without a VPN

How to provide a secure telework environment without much overhead? That was the question facing Octagon Capital, a Toronto brokerage firm that ended up choosing an unusual hardware-and-cloud service from Route1.

Route1, also of Toronto, sells MobiKEY, a user authentication device that looks like a thumb drive. Users simply insert this USB device into any Internet-enabled computer, type in their passwords, and they can securely pull up all of the applications and data from their desktops. MobiKEY works from home, a client’s office or even an Internet café.

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The MobiKEY device ensures that no trace of an end user’s session remains on the computer that is used, and it encrypts all communications between the computer and the desktop machine in the office. It can be integrated with other smart card technologies such as the U.S. federal government’s HSPD-12 identity cards.

Where MobiKEY saves companies money is that it eliminates the need for them to buy VPN hardware or software. The company simply installs the MobiKEY host software on an employee’s desktop computer, and the employee can access the applications and information from any other computer by typing in two layers of password protection.

“Through MobiKEY we didn’t need to set up any VPN,” says Iman Azghar, manager of IT at Octagon Capital. “MobiKEY is the best solution for us because it is very simple installing it – users can do it themselves—and troubleshooting it is very simple.”

The lack of overhead is important for Octagon Capital, which has 80 employees in Toronto, Calgary, Vancouver and Boston. The firm has an IT shop of two full-time and one part-time person.

Route1 officials say MobiKEY is more secure than traditional VPNs, which are often the source of security breaches. Indeed, unsecure remote access is one of the most common ways that hackers get into corporate networks in order to steal data. 

“We’ve never had any security issues,” Azghar says, adding that a hacker would get only four attempts to guess a MobiKEY password before the system would lock up.

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Tanieu Tan, director of marketing for Route1, says other hardware-based telework solutions aren’t as secure as MobiKEY.

“Our PKI infrastructure has proven to be impenetrable,” Tan says. “That’s why banks, enterprises and multiple government agencies around the world use it.”

With MobiKEY, Octagon Capital employees can access their Microsoft Word, Excel and Outlook as well as human resources and trading applications. Octagon Capital has a Multi Protocol Label Switching (MPLS) network from Telus.

“I use the MobiKEY almost every day,” says Michael Ohnona, an investment advisor with Octagon Capital. “It’s very simple to log on. It feels just like I’m working at the office because I have access to the same applications. The real benefit I find is when I have access to my work computer when I’m on vacation or at my client’s office.”

Ohnona says clients are impressed when he can access their files while he’s sitting in front of them. With a traditional VPN solution, it would be more difficult for him to get through his client’s firewall settings to pull up the information, he says.