Beachhead Solutions has expanded the MSP edition of its SimplySecure PC and mobile device security solution to accommodate channel pros who provide co-managed IT services to their clients.
Drawing on existing functionality in that system but new contract language, users who share administrative duties with a client’s in-house IT department can now empower the customer to add or remove devices, quarantine compromised hardware, and take other actions on their own.
“It provides them a much quicker approach to getting that done without waiting on a response from the MSP,” says Cam Roberson, Beachhead’s vice president of sales and channel development. The new permissions allow end users to produce reports on their own as well.
Previously, SimplySecure’s license agreement precluded MSPs from transferring control over any of the system’s functionality to end users. “Our concern, of course, was the three-person medical office where the receptionist is the IT person and doing something that would jeopardize their data,” Roberson explains. “We didn’t want somebody that was less than skilled messing around with the console.”
Businesses large enough to have their own IT staff can handle that responsibility. Some restrictions on what channel pros can entrust to their clients remain in place, however. Only an MSP, for example, can set policies governing matters such as what action SimplySecure takes automatically when users fail multiple logon attempts or logon after an extended absence.
Training materials that MSPs can use to teach customers how to utilize the functionality now at their disposal, and avoid inadvertently compromising security in the process, are currently in development.
Going forward, Beachhead’s standard user agreement will include language giving MSPs the ability to share access rights with customers under defined conditions. Partners who purchased SimplySecure earlier have been sent an addendum to their contract that they can sign if they wish to add the new rights.
Co-managed IT has become an increasingly popular option for channel pros who serve midsize businesses. Though models vary, under a typical arrangement an MSP extends the tools and processes they use when supporting smaller clients to a larger client’s IT department. The customer uses those resources to handle day-to-day monitoring and management, and calls on the MSP for guidance and assistance when necessary.
Companies big enough to have IT employees have been signing up with MSPs in larger numbers this year, many vendors and channel pros report. Corporate IT teams, which are even busier than usual due to the coronavirus pandemic, generally have less experience delivering remote support to work-from-home users than MSPs.
Beachhead plans to add functionality to SimplySecure shortly that will allow the system to act immediately if a device outside a set geographic boundary tries to logon onto a customer’s network. The new feature will allow technicians to automatically quarantine PCs that should never be more than 10 miles from the client’s headquarters, for example, or never outside the country.
Compliance reporting for users subject to regulatory requirements became available to SimplySecure users this March.
