Page 62 - Cyber Defense eMagazine for July 2020

• SDP software allows for data transfer, by way of encrypted micro-tunnels, right from smart IoT
edge devices to various destinations—whether an on-premises site, multi-cloud, or hybrid-cloud
setting.
• To ensure secure connectivity and transmission, SDP also uses public key authentication.
• Specific types of SDP software make this happen through an enhanced user datagram protocol
(UDP), which has randomly generated ports that render the tunnels basically invisible to
cybercrooks.

Other benefits for city IT staff include that SDP offers easy configuration and management, which aids
scalability. The software requires no appliances, and also avoids the various maintenance and security
challenges of VPNs, which were designed for a physical-server environment. SDP has performance
advantages as well, with the encrypted micro-tunnels offering the ability to be made highly available.

Smart devices and edge computing has proven ability to help smart cities advance and problem-solve—
but without secure connectivity, these measures fall short. By pairing an SDP client with smart devices,
those who are working on creating the hyperconnected smart cities that will take us into the future can
safeguard their investment of time, resources, and data as well.

About the author

Don Boxley Jr is a DH2i co-founder and CEO. Prior to DH2i, Don spent
more than 20 years in management positions for leading technology
companies, including Hewlett-Packard, CoCreate Software, Iomega,
TapeWorks Data Storage Systems and Colorado Memory Systems. Don
earned his MBA from the Johnson School of Management, Cornell
University.

Cyber Defense eMagazine –July 2020 Edition 62
Copyright © 2020, Cyber Defense Magazine. All rights reserved worldwide.