Zscaler has introduced the industry’s first Zero Trust Segmentation solution, revolutionizing how businesses securely connect users, devices, and workloads across diverse locations, including branches, factories, campuses, data centers, and public clouds. This innovative approach aims to provide a more secure, agile, and cost-effective alternative to traditional connectivity solutions, such as SD-WAN and site-to-site VPN, which have unintentionally increased vulnerabilities to ransomware.

For years, organizations have relied on conventional network segmentation using firewalls to enhance security. However, these methods often add complexity, inflate costs, and fall short in terms of comprehensive protection. Zscaler’s Zero Trust Segmentation for branches and cloud is designed to directly tackle these issues by eliminating the need for firewalls, network access control (NAC), and traditional SD-WAN and VPN configurations. This solution not only prevents ransomware attacks but also simplifies branch environments, transforming them into secure, café-like spaces without the burden of extensive infrastructure.

With Zero Trust Segmentation, organizations are no longer required to extend their corporate network across distributed branches, factories, and public clouds. Instead, each location operates as a “virtual island” that communicates securely through the Zscaler Zero Trust Exchange platform, which applies policy-based protections to manage secure connections among users, devices, and workloads. This setup helps minimize risks associated with public IP exposure and stops ransomware from spreading laterally between locations, all without relying on Direct Connect or ExpressRoute.

The rapid proliferation of IoT devices and operational technology (OT) in branch offices and factories has intensified the need for robust security measures. A recent Zscaler ThreatLabz report revealed that over 50% of OT devices still operate on outdated systems with known vulnerabilities. To address this, Zscaler’s Zero Trust Segmentation allows organizations to secure every device, including legacy OT systems, within hours without the use of north-south firewalls.

In today’s hybrid and multi-cloud environments, using firewalls to secure workload communications can introduce complexity and risk. Each firewall represents a potential attack surface, and different cloud service providers often require unique security configurations.

Zscaler’s Zero Trust Segmentation standardizes security across multi-cloud and data center environments, eliminating the need for site-to-site VPNs, Direct Connect, or ExpressRoute while ensuring consistent protection for traffic between Virtual Private Clouds (VPCs) and workloads.

Currently, Zscaler’s Zero Trust Segmentation solution supports AWS and Azure, with support for Google Cloud Platform (GCP) expected by February 2025. This addition will further enhance multi-cloud security capabilities, enabling Zscaler to continue providing comprehensive protection across the most widely used cloud environments.