Beyond the Network
Site-to-Site VPN
A site-to-site VPN is the perfect file-sharing solution for businesses with more than one office. In this article, you’ll discover exactly what a site-to-site VPN is, the benefits of using one in your company and the best ones available on the market today. Let’s explore.
What Are Site-to-Site VPNs?
A VPN, or Virtual Private Network, is a method through which two branches of the same company can connect securely. Imagine you’re a business owner and have offices in London, Rome, Madrid and New York. Each of those offices will have a LAN or Local Area Network. In fact, individual areas within a country will have different LANs, too, making sharing files securely a domestic as well as international challenge for companies with more than one office location.
A VPN connection links up the LANs so that employees in the same company can share resources, regardless of their geographical distance. VPNs turn LANs into WANs, which are Wide Area Networks.
Let’s consider how this would work in a practical sense. An employee at the New York office wants to obtain information stored in the Madrid office. This needs to happen securely so that private data and confidential files are kept for employee eyes only. The employee decides to access a VPN and can obtain information from the Madrid database securely. The information is encrypted during the process, meaning that it is less susceptible to theft by hackers or bad actors.
What Are the Benefits of Site-to-Site VPNs?
There are four major benefits to using a site-to-site VPN in your company, including security and affordability. Let’s explore these benefits now.
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Security
The most compelling benefit of site-to-site VPNs is how they guarantee better security. They encrypt data between headquarters and satellite offices - meaning that files, documents, photos and videos are largely safe from the risk of being stolen. Each VPN checkpoint in the tunnel is secure. The company’s information is kept significantly more private, which is especially important for big brands trying to keep a new product under wraps or government bodies doing classified work. This is why site-to-site VPNs have proven to be so popular with major global brands and political institutions.
Affordability
Site-to-site VPNs are an affordable solution when compared to traditional VPNs. These standard VPNs need to be installed on each employee’s devices, whereas only one VPN gateway is required at each office location with site-to-site VPNs. This affordability factor also means that it’s easy to expand should you create a new location or branch out into a new country.
Accessibility
With site-to-site VPNs, documents and files are always accessible by employees. This means that there is minimal risk of a cyberattack bringing down the whole company. Natural events, such as a power outage or an attack, may put a specific office offline, but with secure site-to-site VPNs, your resources are available at all other locations.
Communication
Site-to-site VPNs offer faster communication between different branches. Rather than someone from the Rome office emailing a colleague in the London office and awaiting the required file, it can be sourced more quickly and easily through the VPN tunnel.
Which Site-to-Site VPNs Are Best?
The VPN market size is large, making it confusing for business owners to know which options are the most efficient, effective and reliable. Fortunately, we’ve compiled a list of our five favorites for your consideration.
NordVPN
With an easy-to-use interface and excellent security tools, NordVPN has long been a leader when it comes to site-to-site VPNs. Offering plenty of features alongside site-to-site VPN tools, this brand is reliable and effective and has long been loved by customers. It’s also one of the fastest VPNs on the market, making file access between offices easier than ever.
Mozilla VPN
If you’ve heard of Mozilla before, chances are that you have a friend who uses Firefox as their internet browser. Since the inception of Firefox, this company has created VPN services that are popular among its users. It has a simple design which makes it easy to use, even by those who wouldn't class themselves as tech-savvy. Plus, Mozilla is a not-for-profit organization which makes it a great choice for companies who prioritize non-profit partners and suppliers.
PureVPN
With great offers, PureVPN offers small and large businesses a great VPN solution. Their service protects private data by creating an encrypted tunnel that links your multiple office locations. It’ll work with Windows, Apple and Android devices, meaning it’s suitable for any office environment.
Perimeter 81
Perimeter 81 offers an easy-to-use dashboard and intelligent business VPNs that’ll protect your private documents, files and data. With Perimeter 81, it’s simple to add team members, create user groups and manage permissions—all within a single application. Plus, it’ll work in 36 different countries, making it one of the best site-to-site VPN solutions in the market today.
Are you looking to amp up your Wi-Fi? Read on to learn all about Wi-Fi extenders and repeaters.