What are the risks of connecting to my company network from outside?

Question

What are the risks of using an Android phone as a modem to connect my netbook to my company network from outside the office? Is it better to use a cable to connect them both or bluetooth? I've read that using VPN is good enough to protect my data, is that right?

Answer 1

A few points immediately come to mind:

1. If you're using a vpn, the medium over which you send traffic is of reduced importance. The whole point of a vpn is to create a virtual distributed private network which uses an untrusted network to transmit traffic. As long as the vpn is properly configured (aggressive mode disabled, strong encryption etc) then it is of questionable importance how you gain access to the wider internet.
2. If you are using an IPsec VPN then the security features are implemented within the IP layer of the network protocol stack. This means that all layers under this (data link, physical etc) benefit. Therefore if your connection to your bluetooth device occurs at a lower protocol layer, even if it is compromised, an attacker will not gain access to the higher layer (transport, application etc) data.
3. Regardless of the potential to break the security of your vpn connection, bluetooth is widely considered to be vulnerable to a number of attacks. I'd be suprised if you found a security professional that made anything more than the absolute minimum use of bluetooth for any purposes. If you have a usb cable handy, you may as well use it!