Getting Started with VPN Configurations

Virtual Private Networks, aka VPN, helps the organization provide secure access to corporate resources that are behind a firewall. In most organizations, business-critical information, assets, and resources are often behind a firewall and not accessible over a public network. VPN software helps employees access this data from their devices irrespective of the network that they are in.

If your organization is using a VPN, then it becomes important to be able to configure a VPN on the corporate devices and/or employee/personal devices that are used to access the corporate data. Scalefusion provides the necessary mechanisms to remotely configure the VPN and publish to the Android devices managed by Scalefusion.

Minimum Requirements for VPN

Let us first understand what are the basic requirements in order to configure VPN from Scalefusion Dashboard,

1. Complete the Android for Work Setup from the Scalefusion Dashboard.
2. Corporate Devices must be enrolled via afw#mobilock
3. Personal Devices starting Android 6.0 that have enrolled using the Scalefusion Client.

How Does it Work?

1. An administrator approves the necessary VPN application from Scalefusion Dashboard.
2. The administrator creates the VPN configurations.
3. The administrator publishes the application and the configurations on the corporate or employee/personal managed devices.

How to Configure VPN Service?

Click on the VPN service from the list below to understand how to configure them on the devices,

1. Cisco AnyConnect
2. SonicWall Mobile Connect
3. Pulse Secure
4. Palo Alto

Frequently Asked Questions

Question: On my employee/personal owned devices, is the network from their personal applications routed through VPN?

Answer: No. For the personal devices that have enrolled as BYOD, a Work Profile or a container is created on the Android device. The network and data from the Work Apps will be routed via VPN and not for the apps on the personal side.

Question: We want to tunnel only one application's data through a VPN OR want a per-app VPN?

Answer: Yes, however, this feature is dependent upon the VPN service you are using. Most of the VPN Service applications allow configuring the list of apps that are allowed to use VPN and the list of apps that should be blocked.

Question: Does the VPN work at the device level, and when does it work at a Work Profile level?

Answer: If the device is enrolled as a corporate device (via afw#mobilock), then ideally, the VPN works at a device level. When the device is configured as a BYOD device, then the VPN works only for Work Profile applications. However, in each case, depending on your VPN provider, there might be VPN-specific configurations that limit the VPN to selected applications.

Question: Does Scalefusion support PPTP, L2TP & IPSec VPNs to be configured?

Answer: Currently, except for a few select OEMs, these APIs are not available in Android in general. We are working to see how we can allow you to configure these VPNs on the supported OEMs.