July 22, 2021

Can Cybersecurity Be Robust Without Being Rigid?

Corey Kiesewetter

Decisions around cybersecurity can be stressful, if not plain scary.  The stakes are always high, and it seems like there’s a headline related to a breach or ransomware every other week with a cost to the victim in the millions of dollars.  However, a big part of the stress in these decisions is related more to unintended consequences than whether or not we should be maintaining proper security hygiene. 

For example, a product may offer a very high level of security but also prevent people from getting their work done effectively if they work in a remote area or travel for work.  These solutions are robust but rigid – and are far too common.


What if cybersecurity solutions were more adaptable, more resilient? What if we could drastically reduce the number of situations in which security got in the way of people getting their jobs done?

Security solutions can be more adaptable by incorporating the intelligence to adjust to changing circumstances.  For example, with many organizations bringing people back into the office – at least part time – security policies need to follow users and offer a consistent level of protection and performance wherever they are, without getting in the way.

How Seamless Handoff works

While many other solutions simply force you to bypass security or block web access in many roaming user scenarios, Seamless Handoff keeps people connected safely as they move around.  Intelligence in our unified agent automatically adjusts how security policies are enforced – on the endpoint or in the cloud – to provide the best combination of speed and safety. 

With Seamless Handoff, if a user starts working somewhere that cannot connect through our cloud edge (such as a hotel or business that forces use of its own web proxy), our unified agent will automatically switch from using a cloud proxy to directly enforcing web security policies on the endpoint.  This “Proxy Connect” (PCEP) to “Direct Connect” (DCEP) switching provides a smooth user experience.  Then, it can switch back once the user is able to connect to the proxy.

Here's a video where I demonstrate how it works:


Delight your organization

People no longer have to worry about their security getting in the way or to try to bypass it.  They can easily work wherever they need to – at home, in the office, or even on the road – without having to choose between being secure and being productive.

To us, that is what cybersecurity is really about: seamlessly enabling people to safely get to and use the resources they need to get their job done.

What it means for Forcepoint customers

Seamless Handoff is a no-cost update to customers running a cloud deployment of Forcepoint Cloud Security Gateway or Forcepoint Web Security.  This update brings Seamless Handoff functionality to users running macOS Big Sur, matching the level of functionality we introduced to Windows users earlier this year.

Corey Kiesewetter

Corey Kiesewetter is Forcepoint’s Sr. Product Manager for cloud security products, with a focus on SASE and Zero Trust applications.  Corey has been directly helping IT practitioners realize best practices in datacenter operations the past decade and holds a degree in...

Read more articles by Corey Kiesewetter

About Forcepoint

Forcepoint is the leading user and data protection cybersecurity company, entrusted to safeguard organizations while driving digital transformation and growth. Our solutions adapt in real-time to how people interact with data, providing secure access while enabling employees to create value.