Apple Screen Sharing, Zero Trust, Multi Factor Authentication

ACME Document Printing and Folding is a company that provides custom document printing and folding services. As part of their service, customers deliver marketing outlines and assets, and ACME adapts the material to their printing and folding processes.

The company’s designers have a mac-based desktop at work, but want to work remotely. The mac-based desktops do not have centrally managed single-sign-on and are thus difficult to remotely secure.

ACME, like all other companies in 2023, is seeking to enable efficient remote work while constrained by the technical requirements of their business.

ACME had considered a VPN to use with Apple’s Screen Sharing (and were using with a small number of users) but were concerned about the security. In addition, it was challenging to install a company-supplied VPN solution onto someone’s personal device, so the company was considering port-forwarding as an alternative. ACME had also considered bespoke systems like AnyDesk and TeamViewer. None of these provided single-sign-on, multi-factor authentication, and, access to a single Mac desktop.

ACME had a secondary motivation: their cyber-security insurance provider was not willing to renew their policy because the VPN solution did not allow multi-factor authentication to the remote mac desktops, only all-or-nothing to the VPN itself.

The company chose Agilicus AnyX. After a 1 hour setup, no changes to their existing network or firewall, they had a few pilot users test the solution out, using their personal Macbook from home to the Mac desktop at work, using Apple’s native Screen Sharing over Agilicus AnyX Zero Trust.

After 10 days of the pilot the results were in: the end users were happy, the network administration was happy, the insurance company was happy.

Agilicus AnyX provided unified authentication, meaning users could sign in with their native, natural identity using single-sign-on. This allowed the company’s designers to work remotely without having to remember multiple passwords or manage multiple accounts.

Agilicus AnyX also provided multi-factor authentication, which helped to further secure the company’s data, and was a strict requirement of the upcoming cyber-security insurance renewal.

Agilicus AnyX coupled with Apple Screen Sharing also provided near-native desktop performance, which meant that the remote workers were able to work without experiencing any noticeable lag or latency.

Apple’s Screen Sharing is based on VNC, and the overall data flow can be seen in “VNC Remote Desktop“.

The end users had the simplicity of the port-forwarding, and the company had the security of individual user to device controls.

• Improved security: Agilicus AnyX provides strong security features, including single-sign on, multifactor authentication, and encryption. This helped to protect the company’s data from unauthorised access.
• Increased flexibility: Agilicus AnyX allowed the company’s designers to work remotely from anywhere. This gave them the flexibility to work from home, coffee shops, or even while traveling.
• Reduced costs: Agilicus AnyX was a cost-effective solution. It was less expensive than a VPN and Apple’s Remote Desktop, and it did not require any reconfiguration of the company’s network.
• Increased productivity: Once deployed, the remote workers were able to make changes to customer orders more rapidly.
• Improved cyber security posture: The company was able to renew its cyber-security insurance due to the use of multi-factor authentication.
• Near-native desktop performance: The company found the desktop performance of Agilicus AnyX to be near native local performance.
• Renewed cyber-security insurance: The company was able to renew their cyber-security insurance due to the use of multi-factor authentication with Agilicus AnyX.

ACME and its end-users is very pleased with the results of using Agilicus AnyX. The solution improved security, increased flexibility, reduced costs, increased productivity, improved the company’s cyber security posture, provided near-native desktop performance, and allowed the company to renew their cyber-security insurance. The company’s designers were able to work remotely without any problems, and the company was able to protect its data from unauthorised access.

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