A secure web gateway or SWG is crucial to have in this modern world. There are many areas where SWG can help organizations today. What are these?
A Secure Web Gateway Is What?
An SWG is usually not just another firewall, though it can also be a firewall. It is much more than that. Firstly, it features an intrusion prevention system (IPS). This can help to detect and prevent intrusions and attacks on the network before they have the chance to do any harm.
Also, it is much more than just another layer of protection for a network. It is a step ahead of that and it has a very important role in helping organizations to keep safe from malicious traffic, intrusions, and attacks. How does this work?
When an SWG is implemented in an organization, it will serve to filter all the traffic going through it. No traffic can pass if it is not authenticated and authorized beforehand. So, no malicious traffic of any kind can get into the network from the Internet. It also helps to protect internal resources from attacks from inside the organization.
In addition to that, an SWG features a reputation engine. This can detect and block known viruses, worms, and other malware that might try to enter your network via email attachments or web browsing.
So, this way, it helps to prevent malware infections on computers inside the network. The reputation engine can also detect websites that are known for hosting malware or spreading viruses. And then block them directly to protect the network from infestation by such websites.
A Secure Web Gateway Is What For Organizations?
As mentioned above, an SWG helps to filter out malicious traffic and intrusions from entering the network. Preventing such things from getting into your company’s network is one of the most important things an SWG does for your organization. It will stop malicious traffic before it has a chance to do any harm.
Moreover, it prevents internal computers from getting infected with malware by blocking malicious websites. And then, preventing users from visiting them when they try to open them in their web browsers.
So, this way, it protects people from being infected with malware that tries to spread itself by infecting vulnerable computers when they visit such sites on purpose. Or even by visiting them accidentally. For instance, if they happen to open a spam email attachment that contains a link to some website containing malware.
Further, another very important thing an SWG will do for you is block spam emails before they get delivered to the company’s email servers. This way, they never reach employees’ inboxes at all. So no one has a chance of being distracted by them or opening them up and clicking on links inside them that could redirect users to some malicious website on purpose or by accident.
Conclusion
So, if you are a network administrator, and you have to choose a security appliance for your company’s network, seriously consider investing in an SWG. It will protect you from many threats and it will increase the network’s overall security, which is always a good thing to do for your organization.