LIFULL Overcomes Telework Challenges, Ensuring Both Security and Flexibility

LIFULL Co., Ltd. operates LIFULL HOME’S, one of Japan’s largest real estate and housing information services. The name “LIFULL” reflects the company’s commitment to enriching lives with well-being and peace of mind. Swiftly transitioning to telework, LIFULL prioritizes both customer satisfaction and employee well-being. With the implementation of Netskope, the company has established a zero trust network while ensuring seamless system operations.

Industry

Real Estate

Region

Japan

Employees

2,000+

Year founded

1997

The COVID-19 pandemic forced the entire company to work remotely, leading to speed and security issues.

LIFULL Co., Ltd. provides a variety of information services, including the real estate and housing information service “LIFULL HOME’S”. The company is committed to contributing to its customers and society, while also considering the ease of work for its employees, and has been transitioning to telework since around 2019 by introducing a VPN. However, according to Hiroaki Yamamura, Infrastructure Application Group, Corporate Engineering Unit, Technology Headquarters at LIFULL Co., Ltd, “we did not expect all employees to use it at the same time” as it was still in the early stages of operation.

However, with the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, all LIFULL employees were forced to work from home. The Infrastructure Application Group responded to the shift to telecommuting for all employees by extending its existing VPN capabilities, but as a result, the company’s system ended up being a combination of several solutions that were patchworked together, and the VPN became a bottleneck that slowed the system’s processing speed, creating operational problems that ran counter to the employees’ convenience.

There were also concerns about security issues. As teleworking became the main method of working throughout the company, employees were now doing work that had previously been done on the corporate network from their home network environment. This meant that the existing perimeter-based security could no longer cope. “We wanted to achieve a zero-trust network” explains Yamamura.

After careful consideration, Netskope was selected. The deciding factor was that “user communication was not limited to the browser, so it was a product that acted as a client agent rather than using the browser proxy mechanism.

Hiroaki Yamamura, Infrastructure Application Group, Corporate Engineering Unit, Technology Headquarters
LIFULL

株式会社LIFULL、テクノロジー本部コーポレートエンジニアリングユニットインフラアプリグループ、山村浩章氏

The deciding factors were that it was an agent type and that a virtual appliance for ZTNA could be installed in-house.

To address these two issues, the Infrastructure Application Group considered solutions to replace traditional VPNs. Yamamura said the key words were “zero trust network” and “CASB”. “We selected three or four products from the perspective of achieving a zero trust network, given our company’s completely remote environment and high Internet traffic due to cloud usage and the need to improve security.”

After careful consideration, Netskope was selected. The deciding factor was that “user communication was not limited to the browser, so it was a product that acted as a client agent rather than using the browser proxy mechanism.”

In addition, Yamamura recalls that the ability to install a virtual appliance for ZTNA within the company, a feature of Netskope’s NPA (Netskope Private Access), was also attractive. “Although we use the cloud a lot at our company, we also have infrastructure environments that require an internal network, such as Active Directory and WSUS. NPA was able to communicate with them at any time.”

Yamamura began researching solutions around April 2020. He narrowed it down to Netskope in early 2021, and after a little over a month of PoC, the contract was signed in April, with distribution to employees around May/June. The number of clients increased to about 1,500, but the implementation went smoothly thanks to the use of an installer that detects the certificates on all the devices and installs Netskope remotely.

Although we use the cloud a lot at our company, we also have infrastructure environments that require an internal network, such as Active Directory and WSUS. Netskope’s Private Access was able to communicate with them at any time.

Hiroaki Yamamura, Infrastructure Application Group, Corporate Engineering Unit, Technology Headquarters
LIFULL

NPA has improved the Windows Update deployment rate. It has also eliminated the slowdown during peak hours.

Commenting on the impact of the implementation, Yamamura first pointed out that “the efficiency of implementing feature updates and Windows updates on Windows PCs has improved dramatically.” He continues “when teleworking began throughout the company, only about 60% of all terminals were running Windows updates. However, as a result of NPA enabling constant communication with the server on the corporate network, nearly 90% of the terminals are now always running the latest Windows updates, and we have been able to create an environment where the latest builds can also be applied to feature updates.”

There have also been significant cost benefits. With VPN, the company was spending tens of millions of dollars a year updating authentication tokens and maintaining hardware, but Netskope has saved the company more than $10 million in total costs. “This is only in terms of visible amounts. In addition, by eliminating various hassles such as reissuing tokens and updating maintenance, we have significantly reduced the operational burden within the department,” explains Yamamura.

As for the qualitative effect, there is positive feedback from users. “When using VPN for teleworking, employees competed for bandwidth and the system slowed down due to concentrated access, especially at the beginning and end of the office hours. Since switching to Netskope, the system runs smoothly even during these times and we have received feedback that communication has improved and access is now smoother”.

When using VPN for teleworking, employees competed for bandwidth and the system slowed down due to concentrated access, especially at the beginning and end of the office hours. Since switching to Netskope, the system runs smoothly even during these times and we have received feedback that communication has improved and access is now smoother.

Hiroaki Yamamura, Infrastructure Application Group, Corporate Engineering Unit, Technology Headquarters
LIFULL

The introduction of Netskope has eliminated closed networks at each office. Aiming for a simpler network environment.

With the introduction of Netskope, and NPA in particular, all LIFULL employees can now seamlessly access the company’s infrastructure environment regardless of where they work. Yamamura believes this will “eliminate the concept of internal and external networks.

Until now, the company has built closed networks for each office, but in the future they will eliminate this and aim to realize a “simpler network environment. The goal is to speed up the network and reduce the cost of maintaining closed networks.

“We had actually been considering eliminating the closed network for some time. However, there were many things to consider and we were not able to take concrete steps. With the introduction of Netskope, it has become a reality,” said Yamamura.

IFULL Overcomes Telework Challenges, Ensuring Both Security and Flexibility

In addition, the company is also looking at the security of the entire company from an internal control perspective, and is working with not only the Infrastructure Application Group, but other departments as well. Yamamura explains, “We introduced Netskope as a replacement for VPN and immediately rolled it out across the company. However, the original purpose was to improve the zero trust network and security. We can achieve this with the standard license, but we will also use optional licenses to achieve a more secure network/security and provide it to our employees.”

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