VPN vs. SD-WAN vs. SASE
NewAll three connect people and offices to company systems securely, so they blur together on network resumes. A VPN gives a person or an office an encrypted tunnel into the company network. SD-WAN connects many branches to each other and to data centres, choosing the best link for each kind of traffic. SASE moves the security checks into the cloud, so users reach apps from anywhere without going through head office. Each comes with different vendors and projects.
How to tell them apart on a resume
VPN
Site-to-site and remote-access VPN, IPsec, SSL VPN, Cisco AnyConnect, FortiClient, GlobalProtect, tunnels on firewalls.
SD-WAN
Branch rollouts, MPLS migration, Cisco Viptela or Meraki, Fortinet SD-WAN, VMware VeloCloud, link policies, hundreds of sites.
SASE
Zscaler (ZIA, ZPA), Netskope, Prisma Access, Cloudflare Zero Trust, zero-trust access, retiring the VPN.
The question that settles it
“Were you connecting remote users, connecting branch offices to each other, or moving security checks to the cloud so users reach apps from anywhere?”
Each term in plain English
- VPN
A technology that creates an encrypted, private connection over a public network, commonly used so remote employees can securely reach internal company systems as if they were on the office network.
Ask “Has your team moved away from a traditional VPN toward a zero-trust access model? What drove that change?”
- SD-WAN / MPLS
Ways of connecting a company's branches, offices and data centres into one network (the WAN, or wide area network). MPLS is the older approach: private links leased from a telecom provider.
Ask “How many sites did your WAN connect, and were you part of moving branches from MPLS to SD-WAN? What went wrong during the rollout?”
- SASE / Zscaler
A cloud-based way of securing staff wherever they work: instead of sending all traffic back through the office firewall and VPN, users connect to a nearby cloud service that checks and filters it.
Ask “Were you part of rolling out Zscaler or a similar service? Which applications caused problems during the move away from the VPN?”
- Next-Gen Firewalls (Palo Alto, Fortinet)
The firewall products companies buy and run. Beyond allowing or blocking traffic, they recognise applications and users, inspect traffic for threats, and run VPNs.
Ask “Which firewall vendors have you managed hands-on, and have you ever moved a firewall's rules from one vendor to another?”
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