SASE adoption has been skyrocketing since the start of the pandemic. Secure access service edge, a term Gartner coined in 2019, combines security and networking in a single, scalable, cloud-based platform that fits well in a world in which employees work from home and mostly access cloud-based apps and services.
Now Gartner is pushing a new acronym. Turns out, companies might prefer to get their SASE without the “A” — just security service edge, or SSE. Gartner this month published a Magic Quadrant for SSE (something the company never did for SASE); it’s available from vendors listed in the report (here and here, for example).
How’s SSE different from SASE?
SASE combines five major technologies: cloud-access security broker, secure web gateway, zero-trust network access, integrated SD-WAN, and firewall as a service. Few vendors offer all five, and few enterprises are looking to buy all five at the same time in the same package.
As a result, the SSE offering, which includes the first three technologies — CASB, SWG, and ZTNA — might make better sense, especially in the short term, experts say.
