AI-powered online safety platform Aura has introduced a new business security solution to help shrink the unmanaged device gap that exists in today’s security stacks.
The new identity-centric bring your own device solution built for MSPs
Aura Business for MSPs is a new identity-centric BYOD security solution designed to protect businesses and employees.
It allows MSPs to manage secure access to their client’s IT infrastructure and enables MSPs to secure access to corporate systems from employee-owned devices, without managing the device itself or accessing personal data.
Solution addresses credential theft and user-driven risk
The solution enables employees to improve their own online safety and address credential theft, phishing, and user-driven risks that traditional device management tools can’t reach.
“It gives an employee an opportunity to practice what the security awareness trainings are actually giving you today, and I think it’s a great time now to look at what MSPs are up against regarding BYOD and unmanaged devices,” Aura Business’s Chief Channel Officer, Jason Coville, told Channel Insider in an interview.
“We built a purpose-built application for MSPs to basically provide business applications as well as protect the identity of the person.”
Through this platform, MSPs gain centralized visibility and control across all clients to:
- Multi-tenant dashboard: MSPs can view device health and compliance across all clients in one place.
- Conditional access integration: MSPs can ensure only compliant users can access corporate resources by connecting to Microsoft Entra ID.
- Policy management: MSPs can enforce compliance with their clients’ security policies, such as requiring updates to operating systems if a device is out of date, without full device management.
- Automated provisioning: MSPs can streamline client onboarding and offboarding with Microsoft Entra integrations.
- Direct-to-user support: Aura’s app guides users to fix their own security issues without opening an MSP ticket. Aura also provides 24/7 end-user support to handle technical questions directly.
Why Aura Business is focused on traditionally unmanaged devices
Coville says that the solution offers a fair agreement between the employee and the employer. Credential theft and phishing attempts are significant causes of incidents and have a lot to do with the individual’s behavior in how they treat security.
“Traditional products are doing a good job at managing managed devices … it really starts to fall apart when you start thinking about managing an unmanaged device and thinking about the identity of that individual and how they want to manage that protection,” Coville explained.
Further, the client’s employees gain personalized protection from the most common entry points for attacks without compromising their privacy with access to:
- Protection against malware and unsafe downloads on personal devices.
- Phishing and scam blocking across email, SMS, and calls.
- Password and credential protection to reduce the risk of account compromise.
- Secure browsing and network protection to prevent exposure on public or unsafe connections.
How the BYOD approach enables MSPs to add revenue streams to existing portfolios
According to Coville, MSPs now have an opportunity to add a revenue layer to their business models and extend their perimeter to include managed devices, as well as unmanaged and personal devices.
Aura has also taken several AI steps to analyze malicious inbound communication, such as texts or emails. It’s becoming an increasing part of their business to leverage AI to ensure they’re providing better intel to employees as they manage their own devices.
“For small- and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) today, security is hard. It is changing so fast and it’s really hard for these SMBs to keep up and get the right talent inside their four walls to manage security from unmanaged devices to managed devices to AI attacks and phishing attacks and all these other perimeter threats that they have to defend against,” said Coville.
“If you’re not engaging with managed service providers today to try to provide that intelligence, it’s going to be really hard for SMBs to survive, and they’re going to be constantly vulnerable.”
Why Aura is focused on high-margin opportunities for MSP partners
For Aura, Coville says, their job is to make the products they introduce to the MSP as high-margin as possible, so they can make money, tell a good story to their customers, and make it easy for them to sell.
“Identity protection is in our DNA. Aura has spent years building AI-powered, all-in-one online protection for the whole family, and when we talked to MSPs about their unique challenges, the opportunity was clear,” said Hari Ravichandran, founder and CEO of Aura.
“With a few small adaptations to our platform, we could put our award-winning personal security offerings to work protecting the employee behind the unmanaged device, unlocking new revenue streams for MSPs and an entirely new market for Aura.”