iPassConnect client software provides ‘access any?where’ to ISPs and businesses, enabling remote users to have low-cost and reliable connectivity from all over the world, employing secure end-user authentication using secure socket layer (SSL) and 128-bit key encryption. The users will more than likely be mobile workers employed by large corporations, and partners, requiring constant connectivity, reliability, ease of use as well as ex?tended global coverage. The whole gamut of po?tential users is covered? providing mobile work?ers with secure access to the Internet, corporate applications and critical business information anywhere, anytime over multiple networks to notebooks, PDAs and desktop computers. iPassConnect also enables Internet service pro?viders, telecommunications carriers, value-added resellers and systems integrators to provide glo?bal Internet and remote access services to busi?nesses and individuals.
Secure global remote access is provided through a single interface from any location and from multiple devices, including laptops, pocket PCs and handheld devices. iPassConnect employs proprietary authentication and settlement tech?nologies to seamlessly integrate dissimilar net?work technologies, consolidating billing and en?suring consistent quality and security. With the world’s largest remote access network of over 11,000 POPs in 150 countries, iPassConnect pro?vides mobile professionals with reliable and cost-effective local dial-up and ISDN Internet con?nections anywhere in the world, with redundancy in major business centers.
Currently, the Wass remote access network uses POPs from the world’s leading network op?erators, including Equant, Level3, CompuServe, France Telecom, Pacific Internet, Deutsche Telekom and Gen uity. For example, with over 600 city/town access points in Italy alone, one can see how extensive the service is. iPass ser?vices are interoperable with leading VPNs to also provide secure access to corporate servers from the road.
The challenge met by a product like iPassConnect is to meet the needs of most cor?porations for an easily scalable, interoperable solution that works in tandem with their pre?ferred secure virtual networks. A case study illustrates how this turnkey remote access and settlement solution fulfilled the requirements of ZiLOG, a leading circuit-design solutions com?pany with 120 distributor locations and 1,300 employees worldwide. ZiLOG, headquartered in California, wanted to keep employees and partners connected constantly, using a secure, reliable, user-friendly remote access solution with extended global coverage. They also wanted to reduce connectivity costs, especially in India and Brazil, where remote access had been extremely expensive.
Besides cost-effectiveness and ease of use, one of the main benefits for ZiLOG was reliability. The iPass Operations Group monitors the network for reliability and constantly updates the phonebook in the dialer by routinely remov?ing any POPs that are underperforming. This 2417 monitoring of 11,000+ POPs worldwide ensures that if one local access number does not work, another will be automatically tried. The iPass network, comprising multiple, top-tier carriers worldwide, provides redundancy of multiple access points, eliminating the probTem of busy signals and unreachable numbers.
REPRINTED FROM SC MAGAZINE DECEMBER 2001
SC Magazine
