Zscaler Private Access Network Connector

The Zscaler Private Access (ZPA) service enables organizations to provide access to internal applications and services while ensuring the security of their networks. ZPA is an easier to deploy, more cost-effective, and more secure alternative to VPNs. Unlike VPNs, which require users to connect to your network to access your enterprise applications, ZPA allows you to give users policy-based secure access only to the internal apps they need. With ZPA, application access does not require network access. While ZPA connects users to an enterprise's internal applications, Zscaler Internet Access (ZIA) connects users to public applications on the internet. To learn more about ZIA architecture, see Understanding the ZIA Cloud Architecture. Additionally, ZPA decouples applications from the physical network so you can provide seamless connectivity to private internal applications and assets whether they are in the cloud, the data center, or both. It also adjusts dynamically to network changes, so you can move your resources without impacting user access.

You can configure settings and policies in the ZPA Admin Portal, which also features dashboards where you can see your users and the apps they access, and monitor the health of your servers and resources. You can configure ZPA to automatically discover servers and applications when users request them, or you can configure them manually. You then define policies that specify which apps users or groups can use, and ZPA allows them to connect to only those apps. ZPA renders your applications invisible to all but the authorized users and makes them untraceable to anyone else. Like all Zscaler offerings, the ZPA service is based on Zscaler's global cloud platform, so there is no requirement for additional hardware or upgrades to existing hardware.

The VPN (for Legacy Apps) solution for exception traffic provides a way to onboard applications that require server-to-client connectivity, and acts as an accelerant towards Zero Trust Network Architecture (ZTNA). This solution provides access to applications that can't immediately transition to Zero Trust access. It also minimizes disruption by allowing continued access to critical applications during the migration. The solution builds an alternate path from Zscaler Client Connector toward the Zero Trust Exchange (ZTE) and Network Connector, and from the application toward the ZTE.

The Zscaler solution reduces operational overhead and offers additional security improvements while laying the foundation for security transformation to ZTNA.