There are solutions to security woes though; a VPN is a good way to make someone’s system and connection more secure no matter where they are. Some consumer VPN services have begun offering services that are geared more towards business users and teams; we’ll be going into those today.
The problem with using a consumer VPN to help improve the security of a business connection is that each user needs to create and manage their own account – since sharing one login is often against a VPN service’s Terms of Service. That’s where these new kinds of business VPN come in. Providers such as NordVPN, Windscribe and TunnelBear now offer a service that’s tailored to suit businesses or teams with centralised controls, billing and user management, similar to what you and your team may be used to with other software services such as Microsoft 365. This allows you to provide each of your users with their own unique account, while still allowing you to manage all of them from one place.
Another convenience of using a business VPN service is that they usually have easy-to-use apps available for lots of different platforms. With this, all you need to do is give a quick how-to to your users, get the software installed on their devices, and you’re good to go. All they need to do is sign in using the username and password provided by you; the app will handle the rest. Availability for multiple platforms also means you can help your users to stay secure no matter what device or connection they may be using.
Some VPN apps can also help protect user privacy and prevent them from accessing potentially harmful websites or software. This is often accomplished with browser plug-ins which have access to frequently-updated lists of potentially harmful or annoying sites and content, giving you and your users peace of mind while working or browsing on the internet. It’s also possible to prevent “leaks” – bits and pieces of data sent outside of the VPN tunnel – with these services; they often provide the option to simply block any data that is not sent through the VPN tunnel, or to block all traffic if the connection to the VPN server is lost, even momentarily.
In a previous article, we mentioned Router and Server based VPNs – some more advanced business VPNs such as NordVPN Teams also allow you to connect to those from within the app, making it easier than ever to send settings for securely connecting to a centralised server to your team members.
Next week, we’ll be looking at other reasons you might want to use a VPN for home or business – including privacy and geolocking.
