Cisco Secure Connect stands out as a turnkey Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) offering that simplifies the deployment and management of multi-customer SASE environments. Discover why MSPs should consider Cisco Secure Connect for their service offerings.

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We understand that Managed Service Providers (MSPs) are always on the lookout for solutions that can streamline their service delivery while ensuring top-notch security for their clients. Cisco Secure Connect stands out as a turnkey Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) offering that simplifies the deployment and management of multi-customer SASE environments. Here’s why MSPs should be paying attention to Cisco Secure Connect and considering it for their managed service offerings.

What is Cisco Secure Connect?

Cisco Secure Connect is a unified SASE solution that enables secure access to applications and resources no matter where they are hosted, from any location and at any time. It is built on the robust Meraki platform, bringing together networking and security services through a single, user-friendly interface, simplifying the management of complex multi-cloud environments.

Why Should MSPs Care?

Secure Connect MSP portal capabilities are inherited from the existing Meraki MSP architecture. For MSPs, operational efficiency and the ability to provide a seamless service experience are critical. Cisco Secure Connect, with its new Meraki GUI, enhances the admin experience by streamlining workflows, allowing for easier deployment, usage, and management through a unified cloud dashboard. This improves agility, speed, and scalability, reducing operational complexities.

Cisco Secure Connect MSP Architecture

The Global Overview Page, replacing the older “MSP portal page” and offering a summary view of all customer environments. This allows MSP admins to manage multiple organizations with a single login, while still maintaining customer privacy as each organization’s licensing, inventory, users, and configurations are treated independently. The global dashboard is customizable to select and display the required columns. Also the view can change based on “Organisations”, “ Networks” or “Network Tags”.

Cisco Secure Connect Global Overview Page

Benefits of Adding Cisco Secure Connect to Your Managed Offering

Easy Operations: Raise support tickets directly from each organization’s page on Secure Connect. The platform provides unified support, making troubleshooting for both network (Meraki) and security (Umbrella) simpler.

Global Overview Page: serves as the command centre. This page has been enhanced with a new “Ticket” column, so MSP admins can view and manage support tickets for each organization with ease.

Dashboard Branding: Cisco Secure Connect allows MSPs to brand their dashboard, providing a personalized experience for clients. If this feature isn’t visible, MSPs can request activation through a support ticket.

Automation: Cisco is introducing an integrated API for Secure Connect, consolidating what used to require separate calls to Meraki and Umbrella APIs. This streamlines automation workflows and maintains a unified platform approach.

Monetization: Cisco Secure Connect is based on the Meraki cloud platform, enabling MSPs to upsell additional services without added management overhead. For instance, MSPs can extend their offerings to include physical security by provisioning Meraki smart cameras, all managed from the same portal.

Final Thoughts

Don’t hesitate to reach out to your existing Meraki SD-WAN customers and discuss layering security for secure internet and cloud access. With Cisco Secure Connect, you can augment your managed SD-WAN offering by adding security features with just a few clicks, providing a comprehensive SASE experience.

MSPs looking to simplify their operations while expanding their service portfolio should consider Cisco Secure Connect as a strategic addition to their managed services. It’s a solution that not only brings efficiency but also opens the door to new revenue opportunities.

Set up your Cisco Secure Connect Account today!

Additional Resources

Cisco Secure Connect solutions overview

Cisco Secure Connect Unified SASE Videos

Cisco Secure Connect Documentation

Cisco Secure Connect – Design Overview

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"}]]  Cisco Secure Connect stands out as a turnkey Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) offering that simplifies the deployment and management of multi-customer SASE environments. Discover why MSPs should consider Cisco Secure Connect for their service offerings.  Read More Cisco Blogs 

Go beyond the buzz and build the AI skills you need to meet the challenges of the future.

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With the rapid advancements in artificial intelligence (AI) and the increasing complexity of networks, we face a pressing need for professionals who can leverage AI to enhance network performance and security. Cisco gets it and has answered the call to equip professionals with the skills they need to design and architect AI-integrated networks.

This past week at Cisco Live, we announced our new CCDE – AI Infrastructure program. This new part of our well-known CCDE expert-level design certification focuses on optimizing for GPU utilization and low latency, complying with standards around data and privacy, and ensuring sustainable designs (given the high-power demands of AI data centers).

These initiatives are crucial now more than ever. This program complements recent additions to the CCNA and CCIE Data Center certifications, both of which include relevant Generative AI skills. By investing in AI education and certifications, Cisco is going beyond the buzz of AI — we are helping to build a workforce that is ready to meet the challenges of the future.

What’s also unique about this program is that we will provide entry-to-expert training. Ahead of the first day to test for the exam in February 2025, Cisco Learning & Certifications will provide a comprehensive AI training program.

We are starting with the following foundational-level AI courses:

Leveling Up Your Network Engineering GPT Prompts
A Practical Guide to Networking Prompt Templating
Troubleshooting PC Connectivity
Exploring the OpenAI Python API
Generating Documentation from Technical Sources
Hands-on ChatGPT: Building Infrastructure as Code
Hands-on ChatGPT: PyATS and Genie
Hands-on ChatGPT: A Coding Guide for Network Engineers Uncomfortable with Python

So, what does this mean for you — the engineer, the developer, the network architect?

Simply put, AI will change the way you design, manage, and optimize networks, just as automation once did. At the core of this transformation is AI’s ability to process vast amounts of data and extract meaningful insights that can improve network performance, security, and reliability. And for those of you who learned Python and made your first API calls five years ago (when automation was top of mind), you can handle this AI revolution in a similar way: education.

The key is to learn how Generative AI and AI with Machine Learning (AI/ML) are pivotal in this transformation. For example, Generative AI can create new data samples, which can help simulate network scenarios, predict potential issues, and generate automated solutions, while AI/ML algorithms can analyze network data to identify patterns, detect anomalies, and make predictive adjustments. And as networks become more complex and intelligent, the need becomes critical for skilled IT professionals who can develop, deploy, and manage these AI solutions.

That’s what’s beyond the buzz; it’s not that networks will suddenly become Borg-ified and tasks somehow assimilated; it’s that using AI in and on networks mimics how we use automation. It’s a critical skill that will only grow in importance.

AI initiatives in education and certifications from Cisco

Cisco has been working in the AI space for years. You see it in our collaboration technologies and in our observability/monitoring software. ThousandEyes, for example, has been supplying data and insights for Predictive AI actions (learn more through the recently released ENNA Network Assurance Learning Path). However, the real change lately has been around Generative AI, with the accessibility of ChatGPT having introduced new experimentation and ideation around how GenAI can change the network.

Cisco Learning & Certifications has been at the forefront of integrating AI into its education and certification programs. Our initiatives are designed to ensure that networking professionals are equipped with the latest skills and knowledge to navigate the AI-driven landscape. Recently, we launched the following free tutorials you can take now to establish a foothold:

Beginner: Understanding AI and LLMs as a Network Engineer
Intermediate: Making a ChatGPT Client with Python
Intermediate: Using Cisco XDR Investigate to Deter Cybersecurity Threats
Advanced: Chat with Your Cisco IOS XE Routing Table Using AI

Cisco’s in-depth training on Data Science and Machine Learning for network optimization

In the rush to learn about GenAI, it’s easy to miss the importance of Predictive AI and AI/ML. Cisco’s training programs on data science and machine learning for network optimization are designed to provide professionals with a deep understanding of how to use data and AI to improve network performance. These programs cover a range of topics, including data collection and analysis, ML algorithms, and their applications in network optimization.

Check them out here:

Catalyst Center Assurance
ThousandEyes Internet Insights
Meraki Insight

One of the standout features of these training programs is their focus on practical, hands-on learning. This approach ensures learners are not only familiar with the theoretical aspects of AI and ML but also have the practical skills needed to implement these technologies in their networks.

The future of AI in Cisco networking technology

Look, the buzz is hot for AI. But that’s because the potential here is so great. It’s so similar to the buzz around automation (which, by the way, is still important to learn). AI and Automation are the tools of the network future. The future of AI in Cisco networking technology is incredibly promising, and you can all be authors of it. As AI continues to evolve, we can expect to see AI-driven networks becoming more autonomous and capable of self-healing and self-optimizing in real time. But that high-tech future needs a human touch to build, guide, and maintain the development. Just as with Automation, AI enhances our work and scales our abilities to allow humans to do what humans do best: create.

Time flies. When I joined the Cisco DevNet team six years ago, I was helping network engineers learn developer skills to use the power of software in the network. But now, we need to embrace the fact that practical uses of AI are here to stay. And for those I helped achieve your first “Hello, World!,” I ask you to join us in saying “Hi AI!”

I’m excited about the possibilities AI offers; but I’m more excited about how we at Cisco will enable you to build more, do more, and achieve more. I can’t wait to see the future we write together.

Sign up for Cisco U. | Join the  Cisco Learning Network today for free.

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"}]]  Go beyond the buzz and build the AI skills you need to meet the challenges of the future.  Read More Cisco Blogs 

Learn how Cisco cloud security integrates with AWS Cloud WAN

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In conversations with customers about cloud infrastructure, I routinely hear two challenges when it comes to scaling their cloud deployments, these challenges include:

Achieving secure connectivity across clouds, virtual private clouds (VPCs), regions, and on-premises networks
Ensuring security is baked into the network architecture from the start.

As customers grow their cloud environment, the increasing number of VPCs and regions leads to a complex mesh of connections to ensure their applications and users can access the applications they need, regardless of on-premises or in the cloud. These interwoven spiderwebs of connections make it difficult for IT teams to properly establish secure connectivity throughout the infrastructure which increases management complexity and hinders scale. Because of the challenges organizations face in multi-VPC and multi-region deployments, customers are increasingly transitioning to cloud wide area networks (WAN) services, driven by the desire to centralize and streamline how they manage their network topology and security.

AWS Cloud WAN simplifies how customers build, manage, and monitor their WANs by automating the connectivity between branch offices, data centers, VPCs through automation and a rich dashboard. Customers can use network policies to automate network management and security tasks from a single place eliminating the need to create the complex mesh of traditional VPC peering. Recently, AWS enhanced Cloud WAN to simplify inserting security services or VPC into these connections. This feature enables customers to integrate their Cisco security services into their network with AWS Cloud WAN, significantly simplifying how they add security into their network.

With the release of AWS’ service insertion feature as part of Cloud WAN, I am pleased to announce Cisco Secure Firewall Threat Defense Virtual and Cisco Multicloud Defense support AWS Cloud WAN. With this support, customers can seamlessly integrate Cisco cloud firewalls into their Cloud WAN managed network topology, eliminating the need for complicated routing configurations to ensure the security of their environment. Instead, they can route traffic to their Cisco cloud firewall using the AWS Management Console or API.

Cisco’s cloud firewalls

Cisco provides two best-in-class solutions to help customers secure their cloud environments:

Cisco Secure Firewall Threat Defense Virtual (formerly FTDv) is the virtualized option of the Secure Firewall Threat Defense solution, enabling you to extend your network security capabilities from on-premises into the cloud, gaining a complete view of your network environment.
Cisco Multicloud Defense is a cloud-native security-as-a-service offering that automatically scales to secure your cloud applications wherever they’re deployed. Multicloud Defense offers the same infrastructure automation that you expect from a cloud service, making your security as easy to deploy as your application is.

Benefits of Cisco cloud firewalls with Cloud WAN

Utilizing Cisco cloud firewalls in conjunction with AWS Cloud WAN to enhance the protection of global network traffic offers customers significant operational benefits:

Unified Infrastructure for Security and Global Networking: AWS Cloud WAN offers a unified infrastructure designed for extensive AWS deployments worldwide. The integration of Cisco’s cloud firewalls with Cloud WAN equips organizations with superior security measures for protecting traffic within regions, between regions, and from on-premises networks to cloud environments.
Simplified Multi-Regional Security Deployment: Many enterprises utilizing Cloud WAN establish multi-regional networks to facilitate regional growth or implement disaster recovery strategies. The new service insertion feature streamlines the deployment across multiple regions, enabling straightforward traffic routing for both intra- and inter-regional flows through the security infrastructure, thereby eliminating the complexity associated with intricate multi-regional network arrangements.
Seamless integration: Customers often need inter-VPC, VPC-to-internet, or on-premises-to-VPC traffic inspected. With Cisco’s cloud firewalls supporting Cloud WAN Services Insertion, customers can easily steer network traffic for inspection without creating and managing complex routing configurations.
Ease of management: Customers are constantly looking to simplify operational complexities. Cisco’s cloud firewall does all the heavy lifting in deployment and management, allowing customers to focus on their business priorities.
Figure 1: Multicloud defense architecture in Cloud WAN

Cisco Cloud Firewall with AWS Cloud WAN

Because Cloud WAN operates globally, the best practice is to deploy your Cisco cloud firewalls within the same AWS regions as your application. This ensures that there aren’t any single region dependencies, latency, or bandwidth challenges when securing your network connectivity.

Wrap up

We’re excited for customers to take advantage of this new capability from Cisco and AWS, enabling them to simplify how they secure their increasingly complex cloud deployments. To learn more about how Cisco can protect your cloud environments, sign up for our Cloud Visibility and Risk Report or start your free Multicloud Defense trial to see how you can gain deeper visibility across your environment today.

We’d love to hear what you think. Ask a Question, Comment Below, and Stay Connected with Cisco Security on social!

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As we strive to build an Inclusive Future for All, the work we do to improve inclusion and belonging for LGBTQ+ Cisco employees is essential.

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As we strive to build an Inclusive Future for All, the work we do to improve inclusion and belonging for LGBTQ+ Cisco employees is essential. In this spirit, we are proud to share that Cisco has been recognized by the 2023 Workplace Pride Impact Awards as an Ambassador-level achiever with a 78% rating. Our rating is one of the Most Improved year-over-year among hundreds of companies. Cisco was also the Top Scorer by Industry Sector in the Information & Communication Industry category.

Workplace Pride

Based in the Netherlands, Workplace Pride’s mission is to drive LGBTQ+ inclusion in the workplace across the world by raising awareness and providing measurement, research, and networking opportunities. Their Global Benchmark is the go-to measurement tool of LGBTQ+ policies and practices for international employers, giving participating companies a tailored overview of their organization’s LGBTQ+ policies and practices. Among the 120+ participating companies, many are our customers, partners, and competitors, which allows us to understand how Cisco measures against other companies passionate about inclusion.

Cisco’s Achievement

Our 78% rating was the highest score ever given to Cisco in the 10 years our company has participated in the Global Benchmark, and we are among only 11 companies recognized in the Ambassador tier. With a 26% increase in our rating, Cisco is also one of the most improved among companies participating in the Benchmark. Some of the activities that contributed to this achievement include: the visible support from Cisco leadership, our LGBTQ+ Social Justice Fund, the launch of Pronouns in our Cisco Employee Central (CEC) Directory, Cisco’s Self-ID program, and our Gender Affirmation policies.

“It has been both an effort and an honour to drive Cisco’ participation in the Global Benchmark. I am very proud to see that the recent progress made for LGBTQIA+ employees at Cisco is reflected in our outstanding and record-breaking results for 2023. This shows the true power of collaboration globally and across organisations; together we can truly make a difference for our employees.”

– Anna Chekelova (she/her), Pride Netherlands & Global Assessments Lead

Driving Inclusion

These achievements would not be possible without the tireless work of the Global Pride Inclusive Community, sponsors, the Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, the People, Process & Policy organization and the Benefits team, and many other Cisco leaders, teams and individuals who drive inclusion of LGBTQ+ employees at Cisco every day. A special thanks to the Netherlands chapter of the Pride Inclusive Community, who partnered with Workplace Pride to assess how we are doing and how to continuously improve as a leader in LGBTQ+ inclusion.

“As a People & Communities representative and an ambassador for the Pride & Allies Community, it was my privilege to accept this award on behalf of Cisco. In my years as an HR leader, I have experienced firsthand what inclusion can do to improve engagement and performance. This award shows how Cisco’s Inclusive Communities, powered by diverse employees and their allies, can change our company and industry for the better. Together, we power an inclusive future for all.”

– Jack Naidoo (he/him), People & Communities Director – EMEA North

"}]]  As we strive to build an Inclusive Future for All, the work we do to improve inclusion and belonging for LGBTQ+ Cisco employees is essential.  Read More Cisco Blogs 

Cisco’s vision for Europe's digital strategy sets out 10 tech policies focusing on sustainable growth, leveraging AI and securing cyberspace, skills, partnerships for innovation, and importantly, connectivity for all.

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On Sunday, like 185 million of my fellow European citizens, I headed to my local polling station to vote in the European elections. As the banners come down, and the corks and confetti are swept up, the buzz of campaigning will now shift to practical policy making.

When our elected MEPs (Members of the European Parliament) head to Strasbourg for their first session in July, over half of them will be newcomers. The beginning of a new legislative cycle marks a critical moment for reflection on the policies we need to meet the opportunities and challenges facing our society.

Ten Tech Policies to Power Europe’s Future

Cisco’s vision for Europe´s digital strategy post-elections builds on decade of technology know-how and global innovation. It focuses on sustainable growth; leveraging AI and securing cyberspace; skills, partnerships and guardrails for new innovation; protecting rights and connectivity for all. We set out ten pivotal tech policies that we believe will be instrumental for Europe’s advancement. A roadmap for leveraging technology for the greater good.

Advance responsible governance of AI globally: AI regulations should be globally compatible and interoperable. It should champion international cooperation to mitigate risks through forums like the G7 Hiroshima Process.
Empower the next generation with digital and AI skills: Government, industry and academia should get together to pinpoint and cultivate the AI and digital skills that will be in high demand, ensuring a workforce ready to embrace and leverage AI.
Remove outdated digital devices from critical networks: Critical infrastructure operators should be required to remove end-of-life devices, reinforcing EU efforts to strengthen and secure critical infrastructure.
Set rules for government handling of security vulnerabilities: Establishing rules akin to the US and UK’s ‘Vulnerability Equities Process’, whereby security vulnerabilities are disclosed to vendors by default, would mitigate economic and social risks to companies and individuals.
Finalise an EU-US agreement on government data demands: Concluding a bilateral agreement for data access would meet the needs of law enforcement while protecting citizens’ rights and alleviating legal tensions that are undermining cloud adoption in Europe.
Implement an EU connectivity strategy to bolster networks: The EU can accelerate network roll-out by prioritising investment, advancing technology-neutral partnerships, and removing regulatory barriers for cross-border delivery of services.
Allocate sufficient spectrum for Wi-Fi: Allocating the upper 6 GHz band to Wi-Fi would meet the rising demand in wireless devices and is crucial to achieving gigabit connectivity in Europe.
Enable the clean and green transition with digital solutions: The EU’s industrial, digital, energy, and green policies should be aligned, and access to funding simplified to foster a thriving green single market.
Support free trade and green flows of goods and services: Trade barriers to deployment of sustainable technology should be removed, and the EU should align with trade partners to enable a circular digital sector.
Partner for new economic innovations: Collaborating with like-minded countries and the private sector to adopt global standards and align export control measures would realise the potential of advanced technologies while enhancing trust, security, and resilience.

A Call to European Policymakers for an Inclusive Future

These ten policy recommendations are a blueprint for a digitally empowered Europe. One where connectivity, cybersecurity, skills, and sustainability are not just goals but the very foundation of an inclusive future.

We are calling on European policymakers to embrace these concrete forward-looking recommendations that supports digital innovation to create a more prosperous, collaborative,  inclusive, and resilient society for all.

Discover more about our vision and the full details of each policy recommendation on our microsite.

"}]]  Cisco’s vision for Europe's digital strategy sets out 10 tech policies focusing on sustainable growth, leveraging AI and securing cyberspace, skills, partnerships for innovation, and importantly, connectivity for all.  Read More Cisco Blogs 

In a world where technologies have become the backbone of thriving businesses; efficient public services, and citizen empowerment, the stakes for tech policy have never been higher. Cisco's Ten Tech Priorities to Power the UK’s Future is designed to help policy makers cement the UK’s position as a global tech leader.

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The 2024 UK general election is just around the corner and comes at a pivotal moment for technology policy. In a world where digital technologies have become the backbone of thriving businesses; efficient public services, and citizen empowerment, the stakes for tech policy have never been higher.

Embracing the Tech Revolution

With unprecedented investments pouring into new technologies like AI and quantum, the UK is in the midst of a significant surge in innovation and the rapid development of new and exciting use cases aimed at businesses and our daily lives. Cisco’s recent announcement a new $1bn Global AI Investment Fund is a prime example of this.

The world in which the UK finds itself is arguably more complex and tense than at any moment in recent memory with businesses and citizens needing to navigate global complexities and escalating cyber threats. Meanwhile, the UK’s workforce struggles to keep pace with the digital demands of the future – Future Dot Now suggests that 60% of the UK’s workforce are unable to perform a range of 20 basic digital tasks.

Whoever forms the next UK government will be hugely influential in writing the next chapter of this story.

The future government has a golden opportunity to harness technology policy to steer towards a positive vision whereby digital technology not only boosts business productivity and delivers smarter, more efficient public services, but also keeps our nation and its critical infrastructure secure and fosters opportunities for a more inclusive economy and society.

Ten Tech Priorities for a Thriving UK

Cisco is proud to unveil our vision outlining Ten Tech Priorities to Power the UK’s Future. This framework is designed to help policy makers – whether politicians, officials or regulators – identify some of the key building blocks of technology policy that will cement the UK’s position as a global tech leader.

Our priorities range from advancing responsible AI governance to delivering future-ready cybersecurity. They focus on the need to develop 21st century digital skills and lead a new transformation in how UK public services and businesses use technology. They call on the government to leverage and nurture the UK’s vibrant R&D and tech start-up environment. Tech-led opportunity will not be possible without the secure and resilient connectivity – both nationally and within organisations. And for all of these policies has a key role to play.

The UK also needs to further build its role as a constructive, proactive player on technology policy on the international stage. The UK should exercise its abilities to convene trusted international partners and co-create the next chapter of tech policy that will propel opportunities and economic growth.

How Cisco is Helping Deliver a Tech-Powered Future

I hope our Ten Tech Priorities will help inspire thinking in the next government, not only on the huge opportunity technology presents for the UK but also on some practical building blocks to make that a reality.

Cisco is committed to turning these priorities into tangible outcomes through initiatives like our Country Digital Acceleration programme, which invests in projects that showcase the transformative impact of digital technologies in public services, from hospitals to schools. Additionally, our Networking Academy programme is dedicated to providing all generations with critical digital skills.

As we eagerly anticipate the election results, I’m optimistic about the potential for meaningful collaboration with the next government. Together, we can ignite a tech-powered future for the UK that is as dynamic as it is prosperous. Cisco’s Ten Tech Priorities to Power the UK’s Future, shaping a digital legacy that will resonate for generations to come.

Discover Cisco’s Ten Tech Policies to the Power the UK’s Future here.

"}]]  In a world where technologies have become the backbone of thriving businesses; efficient public services, and citizen empowerment, the stakes for tech policy have never been higher. Cisco's Ten Tech Priorities to Power the UK’s Future is designed to help policy makers cement the UK’s position as a global tech leader.  Read More Cisco Blogs 

Enterprise Strategy Group Report Identifies Crucial Requirements for Scalable Security, Multicloud Visibility, and True “Shift Left” DevSecOps

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For increased agility, scalability, and pace of innovation, modern businesses are building and adopting   cloud native applications and practices. However, the highly distributed, microservice-based architecture of these applications creates a unique set of challenges, particularly around security. Enter Cloud Native Application Protection Platforms (CNAPPs).

According to the 2023 Gartner® Market Guide for Cloud-Native Application Protection report, “Until recently, comprehensively securing cloud-native applications required the use of multiple tools from multiple vendors that are rarely well-integrated and often only designed for security professionals, not in collaboration with developers. This lack of integration creates fragmented views of risk with insufficient context individually making it difficult to prioritize the actual risk. As a result, fragmented tools create excessive alerts, wasting developers’ time and making remediation efforts confusing to target roles.”

CNAPPs address the full life cycle protection requirements of cloud native applications from development to production. They bring together multiple security and protection capabilities to identify and prioritize excessive risk of the entire cloud native application and its associated infrastructure.

Much of their core value lies in early risk detection in the software development lifecycle, enabling faster remediation. This unified, consistent, and continuous posture enhances overall cloud security and policy compliance.

A recent Enterprise Strategy Group (ESG) white paper, Enhance Security and Gain Comprehensive Visibility with Cloud-native Application Protection Platform (October 2023), details the importance of CNAPPs for organizations that need to drive efficiency, security, and compliance across their software development lifecycle (SLDC) and cloud estate.

The white paper indicates that almost half of the developers surveyed say they regularly push code to production with known vulnerabilities. With 97% of organizations experiencing a cybersecurity incident related to internally developed cloud native applications in the previous 12 months, the risks and stakes are too high to continue with a patchwork approach to security.

Organizations need a modern security solution to support the developer-ready, complex infrastructure needed for application development. They need unified visibility, automated security, compliance monitoring and reporting, and centralized management that only a CNAPP can provide.

Rising Demand for Unified End-to-End Security

The ESG white paper points to three main benefits of CNAPPs which are multicloud visibility, acceleration of “shift left” protection, and proactive cloud-security governance. Taken together, these capabilities are creating a new and unified approach to securing the cloud native application estate.

• Complete visibility across multicloud infrastructures

Designed for cloud scale, CNAPPs offer insight into the security of multicloud environments. This allows security teams to simplify security management and orchestration of public and private cloud resources.

As defined by Enterprise Strategy Group, “A CNAPP should work across all applications, microservices, APIs, and cloud resources deployed and provide the needed level of artifact and exposure scanning. It should provide a single dashboard that spans all public cloud service providers. The platform should also prioritize mitigation, reporting on the automated steps available, as well as the actions that should be handled manually.”

• True “shift left” DevSecOps

Organizations remain under enormous pressure to optimize and release code faster. According to ESG, almost half (48%) of those surveyed regularly push code with known vulnerabilities to production and nearly one-third (31%) do so occasionally. Consequently, 97% experienced a cybersecurity incident in the previous year related to internally developed applications.

CNAPPs enable streamlined security testing integrated into modern DevOps practices. This balances security and speed in a way that won’t slow down innovation. With rapid testing, risk identification, and remediation, organizations can reap the benefits of reduced developer costs and faster speed-to-market.

•  Facilitation of end-to-end cloud security governance

CNAPPs provide a holistic view spanning application development, deployment, and runtime. This enables proactive risk assessment and compliance monitoring, and consistent enforcement of security governance policies across multi-cloud environments.

They also offer the ability to automatically detect and, in some cases, remediate misconfigurations, vulnerabilities, and threats in real time. Additionally, by integrating with or in some cases ingesting threat feeds and analytics, CNAPPs enhance detection capabilities so security teams can swiftly respond to emerging threats.

CNAPPs are gaining traction among security teams. They overcome the challenges of siloed point solutions, and protect organizations from the cost of financial, reputational, and intellectual property losses.

Cisco Cloud Application Security is Transformative

Cisco Cloud Application Security is a unified security solution. It delivers end-to-end visibility and protection across the application lifecycle. It combines cloud security posture management (CSPM), cloud workload protection (CWPP), API security, and infrastructure as code (IaC) security.

As a result, organizations can monitor, prioritize, and remediate a wide range of security threats while also achieving granular governance and compliance requirements. It provides code-to-cloud protection from development to runtime, and empowers organizations to safeguard their APIs, serverless functions, containers, and Kubernetes environments.

Security teams can protect all their cloud assets using an agentless approach to scan cloud environments, including AWS, Google Cloud, Azure or any combination of these. Inventory and mapping of assets and their relationships using an advanced graph database enables comprehensive visualization of the entire cloud estate.

Cisco Cloud Application Security also helps organizations prioritize risks. It offers an attack path engine with advanced attack path analysis capabilities that help security teams see their environment from the point of view of an attacker. For example, teams can analyze and understand misconfigurations and overly permissive roles that could be exploited to gain unauthorized access to a system or network.

The analysis goes beyond surface-level insights with root cause identification and step-by-step, guided command line remediation. Additionally, the solution integrates with development-routed workflow and ticketing tools for quicker resolution.

The transformative benefits of Cisco Cloud Application Security are clear: Improved visibility, better risk prioritization, reduced costs, and higher productivity. As part of Cisco’s unrivaled portfolio of security solutions, it offers a differentiated code-to-cloud experience for comprehensive cloud security that is available as a standalone service or as part of the Cisco Cloud Protection Suite.

To learn more, visit Cisco Cloud Application Security

We’d love to hear what you think. Ask a Question, Comment Below, and Stay Connected with Cisco Security on social!

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Gartner, Market Guide for Cloud-Native Application Protection Platforms, By Neil MacDonald, Charlie Winckless, Dale Koeppen, 14 March 2023

GARTNER is a registered trademark and service mark of Gartner, Inc. and/or its affiliates in the U.S. and internationally and is used herein with permission. All rights reserved.

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Check out a recap of our latest Cisco Security announcements. Read on to hear about all the security innovation, what it means for partners, and what’s ahead together.

​[[{"value":"

From celebrity guest speakers, once in a lifetime musical performances, and Cisco Security innovation, it was an incredible week at Cisco Live US 2024!

I’m here to give our #CiscoPartners a recap on at least one of these notable items, our Cisco Security announcements. Read on to hear about all the security innovation, what it means for partners, and what’s ahead together.

Catch up on Cisco Live

We’ve been on a roll with rapid innovation across the Cisco Security Cloud. Building on that momentum at Cisco Live, we shared a few big product announcements coming by end of calendar year or sooner. Make sure you check out the Partner Launch Experience for more details on the announcement goodness.

Taking Hypershield further

Launched in April, this groundbreaking product features a new distributed architecture integrating network and workload enforcement points under a unified management system. Now AMD Pensando Data Processing Units (DPUs) are available from leading vendors, including Cisco’s Unified Computing System (UCS).

Firewall growth

Firewall is the foundation for our Security Cloud. We’re offering price-performance leadership and AI-powered management with:

New Firewall 1200 Series eliminates the need to have multiple appliances for switches, routers and firewalls at enterprise branch locations.
Firewall Threat Defense 7.6 software release streamlines SD-WAN deployment.
New, AI-native management architecture, Security Cloud Control, will configure, manage and monitor the entire Cisco Security Cloud, beginning now with Cisco’s network security solutions.

Integration with Splunk

We’re bringing Splunk together with the Cisco Security Cloud to change the game for threat detection and incident response. Security is fundamentally a data problem. We’re solving that with new sources of telemetry and unparalleled network visibility with Meraki MX and XDR integration, plus a unified Security and Splunk app.

Enhancing the platform story

We’re eliminating point solutions with partnerships across the industry, including Google. We announced a collaboration between Cisco Secure Access with Google Chrome Enterprise browser, bringing the best of our browser security and Google’s cloud security together to help simplify security for our customers.

With Cisco’s unified, AI-driven, cross-domain security platform, customers will experience the balance of power tipping in favor of the defenders. With more value to customers, comes more value to you as a partner with greater profitability and growth. As a Cisco partner, you can also capture new, high-value, mission-critical service revenue.

What’s Ahead for Security + Partners

As our SVP of Partnerships & SMB, Rodney Clark said so well, “our success in the partner ecosystem relies on our ability to co-create solutions, co-innovate, and co-deliver value to our customers.”

I’m excited to spend some time next week at an event hosted by a critical member of our partner ecosystem, AWS. Cisco is a proud gold sponsor at AWS re:Invent in Philadelphia June 10-12. If you’re in town, join us for a fun social event on Monday, June 10 to gain deeper insights into the world of AWS and Cisco Security. If you are attending the event, stop by and see us at booth #1423 in the expo hall to chat with our security experts.

Following the conference, we’re also offering a virtual Immersion event about how Cisco Multicloud Defense on AWS adapts seamlessly to changes within a complex IT environment.

Finally, I shared with you back in April about our new Cisco Security Concierge Deal Support to protect deal registration and give you a “white glove” service. We’re continuing to provide partner offers aimed at a simplified experience and maximum profitability:

Earn more, consistently for targeted firewall competitive takeout and upgrades to the newest software and latest features.
Get rewarded for customer assessments based on finding security opportunities aligned to our top use cases.

More to come as we roll these programs out in the coming weeks.

Thank you again to the 150+ partners and exhibitors who supported us this year at Cisco Live! Here’s to more “better together” moments as we close out Cisco’s fiscal year strong and take FY25 by storm.

Visit the Cisco Partner Launch Experience today!

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"}]]  Check out a recap of our latest Cisco Security announcements. Read on to hear about all the security innovation, what it means for partners, and what’s ahead together.  Read More Cisco Blogs