Hello, and welcome to Implementing Microsoft Windows Always On VPN.
My name is Richard Hicks.
I'm the founder and principal consultant at Richard M. Hicks Consulting.
You can find me on Twitter @richardhicks or visit my
website, www.richardhicks.com.
I'm also the author of Implementing Always On VPN: Modern Mobility
with Microsoft Windows 10 and Windows Server 2022. Visit
aovpnbook.com to learn more. In this module,
we'll take a high‑level look at Always On VPN.
We'll talk a little bit about what Always On VPN is specifically. Always
On VPN is the successor to Microsoft DirectAccess.
We'll talk a little bit about DirectAccess and the current state
of that solution today. We will also talk a little bit about the
constituent components that are required to build an Always On VPN
supporting infrastructure,
what services have to be in place in order to support Always On VPN.
And finally, we'll talk a little bit about some of the
advanced cloud integration and modern management
capabilities supported by Always On VPN.
So what is Always On VPN?
Well, principally speaking,
it's secure remote access. Secure remote access has been around with us for
many years, and historically it was implemented ad hoc.
It was a, very much a nice‑to‑have feature, but given current events and the
move towards predominant or even exclusive remote mobile workforces, having an
enterprise mobility strategy is considered an essential service today in most
organizations. Of course, having an enterprise mobility solution in place does
allow you to improve productivity for your field‑based workers, it does allow
your systems management folks to better manage their endpoints, and from a
security perspective,
having visibility control for those endpoints that are exclusively or
predominantly outside of the office is a huge win.
So Always On VPN provides secure remote access in a seamless,
transparent, and always on, or always connected, way. Always On VPN, in its
default configuration, is completely transparent to the user,
does not require any user interaction to establish the connection.
Now, if this sounds familiar to you,
you probably have experience using Microsoft DirectAccess because Microsoft
DirectAccess had a very similar user experience, and in fact,
the user experience for Always On VPN is identical.
The way in which we implement the technology,
the fundamental mechanics, or the plumbing underneath of the infrastructure, is obviously quite different.