GTT study reveals SASE and SSE adoption surge

GTT Communications has unveiled findings from its latest study: Trends and Solutions for a More Secure Perimeter. The report highlights the growing reliance of enterprises on Software-Defined Wide Area Network (SD-WAN), Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) and Security Service Edge (SSE) as essential defenses against cybersecurity threats designed to exploit the vulnerabilities that come with cloud-first networking and remote or hybrid work environments.

GTT commissioned a study from Hanover Research to examine security concerns and the deployment of SD-WAN enabled SASE frameworks and SSE solutions. Key findings indicate that undetected vulnerabilities, ransomware, data theft and network interruptions are the most pressing concerns for IT leaders, with only a 3 percentage points difference in response rates ranging from 46% to 43%. In line with the evolving integration of security solutions with advanced networking, the study found that to combat these threats, 35% of enterprises have implemented a SASE framework while 42% have deployed SSE.

“While any security incident can lead to reputational damage and financial loss through ransoms, downtime and more, undetected vulnerabilities can be particularly damaging because they allow threats to persist undetected, potentially leading to the silent exploitation of networks over an extended period,” said Tom Major, Senior Vice President, Product Management and Technology, GTT. “Once inside, a hacker can steal sensitive data, exfiltrate intellectual property, disrupt operations, plant further malware and use the compromised network to launch attacks on others — all without being detected. Organizations that deploy a layered framework like SASE can bring about the comprehensive shift to a zero-trust corporate security posture, enabling employees to maintain simple and secure access to data and applications anywhere in the world.”

“The survey results indicate that enterprises today are entering into an increasingly complex and sophisticated threat landscape posing unprecedented risks to their operations,” said Kimberly Pate, Managing Research Director, Hanover Research. “This is driving stronger collaboration between security and networking teams, as they work together to integrate security measures directly into their network infrastructures for enhanced protection and agility.”

The majority of those surveyed operate with integration between security and networking teams when it comes to managing their SD-WAN, SASE and SSE solutions. Where each solution type has been deployed, about two-thirds of security and networking teams work together to manage it, with a more or less even split among the remainder having one or the other team running it exclusively.

Hanover Research surveyed 314 IT, infrastructure, networking, security and other managers (or higher) around the world across retail, hospitality, manufacturing, food and beverage, healthcare, financial services, tech and more. Each respondent represents at least five enterprise network locations and annual revenues of $200 million or more.