Security Basics mailing list archives
RE: Home laptops on a corporate network
From: "Petter Bruland" <pbruland () fcglv com>
Date: Tue, 8 May 2007 10:51:40 -0700
Totally agree, not recommended. Earlier we had some posts about patch management, and from what I gathered, you could get some control by using PatchLink. Although, that does not protect you 100%, you could place the VPN users on their own VLAN where you can restrict the amount of access to internal servers/services. I've seen a different "solution" (not sure how much of a solution that is) where the firewall is a high end Sonicwall, like the 4060 etc, and the VPN clients were terminated to their own LAN segment. Then the Sonicwall would use it's Security Services (Content filter, gateway AV, Client AV enforcement, anti-spy ware, intrusion prevention) to filter traffic between the VPN users and the rest of the network. Also I'm not too familiar with the restrictions of HIPAA and SOX, so the above might not event be "allowed" according to HIPAA/SOX. I think this is a very common scenario, so any feedback (NOT FLAMING) is appreciated. -Petter -----Original Message----- From: listbounce () securityfocus com [mailto:listbounce () securityfocus com] On Behalf Of christopherkelley () hotmail com Sent: Tuesday, May 08, 2007 10:12 AM To: security-basics () securityfocus com Subject: Re: Home laptops on a corporate network I'd recommend NOT doing this. Especially if you are trying comply with HIPAA. Keep in mind that you will have little to no management capability over these personal laptops, which means you have no ability to verify patch level and AV update on these machines that may have EPHI on them. Not to mention the fact that these employees are probably taking them home and plugging them into their home networks, where they (or their kids) are running bearshare, gnutella, grokster, bitorrent, and surfing to unfiltered web sites. Not only does this mean that they are potentially exposing critical data in this manner, it also means they are bringing potentially infested computers into the soft chewy center of your network. Whenever you have an employee with a laptop, you create a liability to your network, allowing them to use personal laptops presents an even bigger liability. IMHO, this level of risk is unacceptable, especially from a HIPAA compliance standpoint.
Current thread:
- Re: Home laptops on a corporate network christopherkelley (May 08)
- RE: Home laptops on a corporate network Petter Bruland (May 08)
- Re: Home laptops on a corporate network gjgowey (May 09)
- Re: Home laptops on a corporate network Christopher Kelley (May 09)
- RE: Home laptops on a corporate network Adam Rosen (May 09)
- Re: Home laptops on a corporate network gjgowey (May 09)
- RE: Home laptops on a corporate network Adam Rosen (May 09)
- RE: Home laptops on a corporate network Petter Bruland (May 08)
- RE: Home laptops on a corporate network Nick Duda (May 08)
- Re: Home laptops on a corporate network gjgowey (May 08)
- Re: Home laptops on a corporate network Ansgar -59cobalt- Wiechers (May 08)
- Re: Home laptops on a corporate network Yousef Syed (May 09)
- RE: Home laptops on a corporate network Adam Rosen (May 09)
- Re: Home laptops on a corporate network gjgowey (May 09)
- Re: Home laptops on a corporate network Yousef Syed (May 09)