Virtual offices have become a common term in the world of business, thanks to the ever-advancing technology. It is not unusual to see people work in the comfort of their homes or even in some social places where the environment can allow it. This freedom leads to increased productivity and, in most cases, at a lower cost. However, the staff working in these virtual offices need to access databases and other corporate resources from the physical office, and this is why we need a network. We are practically connecting two networks that of the office and that of the virtual office. This is why we need routers.
WINDOWS server 2008 is enabled by default to act as a router. All that is needed is a few configuration settings. Using such a server computer as a router comes with several advantages; It is cheap since no extra cost in hardware or software is incurred and time-saving. In addition to the routing services, it will still act as the local server, the Virtual Private Network Server, dial-up remote access server, and as a Network Address Translator.
The Virtual office staff needs to access all corporate resources as per their defined user privileges. This calls out for an access method that can allow full network access. The tunnel client access method is the best suited for these users. The users need to be issued with laptops and other mobile devices that may be required and have the tunnel clients deployed on these devices (Jazib & Qiang, 2008)
When network access is possible from a remote location, then corporate resources’ security becomes an issue. Hackers are a major threat to information security. They are well aware that Virtual Private Networks, like any other Private Network, hold valuable information. VPN’s are transmitting this information securely over an insecure network, and this makes them a big target for hackers. User authentication is the core factor in ensuring information security.
One should enact strong password policies if the systems are password protected. To be on the safer side, I would recommend using biometric techniques such as fingerprints in addition to passwords. Since this is an internet-based application, it is important to wad off worms and viruses using strong, up-to-date antivirus software. VPN authentication should be designed to include host identification. This will ensure that the device used to access the network is corporate-owned. This reduces risks such as virus transfers and key loggers involved when the network access is via a shared or public computer (Song, n.d).
Database access is a key player in any information system. By optimizing database performance, you also heavily impact the overall system performance. Strategic Disk configuration is one way to enhance speedy database access on an SQL Server 2005. This is achieved by separating data and log files on the storage disks. Log files are accessed sequentially, while data files are accessed randomly. Putting them together will slow down the performance, and hence one should physically separate them during storage. Each file category should occupy a different RAID on the disks. (Yegulalp, 2007)
References
Jazib, F &, Qiang, H, (2008). SSL Remote Access VPNs (Network Security). Cisco Press. Web.
Song, S. (n.d). SSL VPN Security. Web.
Yegulalp S. (2007). Partition Indexes for Better SQL Server 2005 Performance: SQL Server Insider. Web.