Introduction

Just as Chapter 5, Securing Network Services and Protocols, discussed new challenges in securing network transmissions for users in a LAN environment, the increasing prevalence of the Internet as a communications necessity has also made life both easier and harder for users who want to access network resources from a home office or other remote location. Even a scant half-decade ago, remote access for home users was primarily limited to dial-up modems connected directly to a LAN server, and satellite offices relied primarily on dedicated WAN links that merely extended the geography of the LAN the bandwidth was not shared with other companies and only needed to be secured in the same manner as other LAN traffic. This provided good data security, but created great inconvenience and expense for remote users who were faced with long-distance telephone charges and costs of expensive dedicated links. Using the Internet as a communications medium, by contrast, allows individuals and businesses to leverage existing Internet connectivity (including the increasing number of broadband installations in residences) to access company resources. However, this ease of use comes at a price: without proper planning and implementation, network security could suffer significant losses from transmitting sensitive data over a public network like the Internet. This has led to the increasing popularity of virtual private network, or VPN, technology within the corporate enterprise.

Windows Server 2003 offers a number of remote connectivity services and applications that we discuss in this chapter. Depending on your connectivity needs, Windows Server 2003...