BYOD Wireless Architecture and Management

Wireless infrastructure unifies all things mobility – access management, the network infrastructure and mobility applications – into one cohesive system that strengthens security and simplifies bring-your-own-device (BYOD) initiatives.  Gone are the days of simply installing a few wireless access points in your enterprise. You want to take a big-picture approach to assure that you do things correctly, from the start, even if your budget requires a multi-year implementation process.  There are many components to think about.

Network Infrastructure

The core of your wireless network will be your managed Ethernet switches and cabling infrastructure.  To power your wireless access devices, you will want POE switches with Gig-E ports, since wireless access points will be servicing multiple users.

The proper wireless access points will need to determined through the use of a site survey to determine the RF levels that will be required to service the employee density of your facilities.  How many wireless device will access the network from each location of your facilities?  What bandwidth do you want to have available?  The speeds available will be determined by  a variety of factors, including: distance from access point, number of connections to an access point, bandwidth required by each device, along with the effect on RF caused by office partitions, shelving and other obstructions.  There are all kinds of wireless access points, so you want the correct RF distribution for each location of your facility.

Should you support 801.1ac,  the new and coming gigabit standard?  All Android smartphones support this standard, though the Iphone (as of Jan 2014) does not, as of yet.  But this standard will become the norm over the next couple of years.  Operating on the 5GHz radio spectrum, 802.1ac is less susceptible to interference, but requires more density of access points to utilize the high speeds. Whether you invest now, or in the future, you need to understand your options.

Will you need outdoor access or service to areas that will be cost prohibitive to run cables to?  There are access points that will accomplish that, as well.

VPN Clients should be selected to provide a seamless access process from Android, Apple iOS, Mac OS X, and Windows mobile devices.  Software designed for this purpose will automatically configure the client wireless LAN settings on their device, without the need for user intervention or complicated logins.  For high security operations, there are VPN clients to support the highest level of cryptography.

Location Awareness will be useful in the retail environments to allow providing information to users based on their locations.  This can include maps, menus, coupons and all kinds of exciting services.

Wireless Access Management

Wireless Access Management is a key component of any BYOD and MDM solution, unless you want to spend time and effort provisioning everyone who accesses your network, which likely is not the case.  The most robust solutions will give you the tools  to identify who is on the network, where they are accessing the network, the mobile devices they’re using, and how much bandwidth is being consumed by specific devices.    Other tools will detect and locate unauthorized clients and access points as well as attacks against the wireless infrastructure to dramatically strengthen network security and compliance requirements.  A good wireless access management system will also manage network policies, securely onboard and manage devices, admit guest users, and even secure, distribute and manage mobile work apps, for your entire organization globally.

Contact the experts at SASE Experts to help guide you through the evaluation and implementation process, whether your company has one facility or 5000.