Almost overnight, it seems like a vast portion of the world has no choice but to resort to working from home, as the most effective coronavirus preventive measure of social distancing is increasingly enforced in more affected areas.

Australian businesses had already been stepping up their remote working game in recent years, even before the COVID-19 pandemic had broken out. Data published by Indeed at the beginning of 2019 indicates that 68 per cent of Australian businesses already have remote working policies in place, for some staff, for at least some of their time.

Working with just a laptop and a reliable internet connection is no longer the domain of only road-weary sales representatives and marketing executives. In 2020, a majority of businesses could be offering remote working capabilities, with some estimates predicting a whopping 92 per cent of companies could do so before the year is out.

With the deluge of employees making the sudden switch to remote working, it can be a real test of the organization’s network security and other vectors of cybersecurity threat — some might be targeted attacks from hackers or phishing attempts. Other instances might be broader threats, affecting entire networks linked and therefore compromised by an unpatched server or a compromised sharing protocol.

Company cybersecurity administrators need to be wary of numerous possible threats and potential vulnerabilities, to protect employees, but balance and maintain essential levels of productivity. Hence there are specific cyber solutions that might be more adept at tackling remote cybersecurity risks when employees are outside the secured network at HQ, for instance, or when staff cannot access secured Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) and are therefore more at risk from scams, malware, ransomware, and other external hazards.

DNSWatchGO from WatchGuard provides protection and content filtering on a Domain Name System (DNS) level and is implemented on all endpoints’ DNS lookups so that a user can be secured outside the network without needing a fragile VPN.

Malware and other security risks can be detected at the DNS level from wherever the staff might be physically located, regardless if he or she is at home, in a hotel room, or a public location. DNSWatchGo’s default security setting is “always-on” even outside of the traditional secure network’s boundaries, and is lightweight enough to function effectively on most devices including those that might not be updated to the newest OS and apps.

DNSWatchGO actively identifies DNS requests from risky sources, so when a user clicks on a link, DNSWatchGO will compare the link’s destination with its database of intelligence feeds, blocking those that originate from a previously-recognized malicious source.

A 100 per cent cloud-based service, network admins can centrally manage DNSWatchGO for every single user in their organization with no hardware, and zero need to update software manually, making it a breeze to deploy and saving effort, money, and time in the process.

Along with filtering content to help maximize productivity, DNSWatchGo supplies instant, continuous visibility of users’ web activity, inside and outside the secured office network. Additionally, when a click to a phishing site is detected, DNSWatch redirects the user to an interactive, educational video which offers training on how to handle a phishing attack attempt in the future.

WatchGuard is offering free and discounted services to aid companies in protecting their increasingly mobile workforce during this pandemic period: in particular, the WatchGuard Passport which bundles together the DNS filtering and web policy-enforcing DNSWatchGo with the multifactor authentication capability of AuthPoint. Enterprises can try WatchGuard Passport for free for up to 250 users, for a 120-day trial period.

WatchGuard Passport can work together with powerful cloud-hosted firewall FireboxV and WatchGuard mobile VPN to bolster your organization’s security both within and without the office. To register for your free FireboxV license for 120 days, contact your local WatchGuard Partner.