Meet the two new security technologies Gartner is priming for 'mainstream adoption'

Remote working tech expected to get boost from ongoing pandemic

Gartner believes two emerging security technologies are set to hit mainstream adoption on the back of the COVID pandemic.

Bring your own PC (BYOPC) security and secure access service edge (SASE) have both reached the ‘Peak of Inflated Expectations' in Gartner's Hype Cycle this year (see below).

They will reach mainstream adoption in the next 2-5 years and 5-10 years respectively, according to the market watcher.

CIOs are playing catch up after COVID left organisations with no alternative but to enable employees to work from home using their own PCs.

As ‘BYOPCs' are often infected with malware and fall victim to phishing attacks, IT must limit and control access by offsetting the PC hardware investment with critical security technologies such as multifactor authentication, cloud access security broker (CASB), zero trust network access (ZTNA), virtual desktop infrastructure, and desktop as a service, Gartner said.

"Without investment in these technologies, IT faces a much higher potential cost in the form of ransomware," said Rob Smith, senior research director at Gartner.

"It is also critical that IT works with HR, legal, and workers councils to develop a proper work-from-home policy."

SASE, meanwhile, is being turbo charged by the heightened need for business continuity plans that include flexible, anywhere, anytime, secure remote access, at scale, even from untrusted devices, Gartner added.

"As SASE services are cloud-native — dynamically scalable, globally accessible, multitenant and including zero trust network access, they are driving its rapid adoption. Over the last three months, SASE has been adopted by more than 40 per cent of global remote workers," said Joe Skorupa, distinguished research vice president at Gartner.