Workspace Protection: Securing Hybrid Work While Governing Employee Use of AI
Sophos Workspace Protection expands Sophos’ portfolio with an accessible and affordable alternative to heavyweight and cost-intensive SASE solutions for securing hybrid and remote work.
Built around the Sophos Protected Browser, powered by Island, Sophos Workspace Protection protects applications, data, users, and guests wherever work takes place
Managed through the Sophos Central platform, it provides organization-wide visibility into and control of Shadow IT and Shadow AI usage to help organizations assess risk and govern the safe adoption of emerging technologies, including generative AI
Sophos, a global leader of innovative security solutions for defeating cyberattacks, today announced Sophos Workspace Protection, expanding its portfolio to help organizations secure hybrid work and govern the use of emerging technologies, including AI. Built around the Sophos Protected Browser, powered by Island, the solution enables organizations to protect applications, data, users, and guests wherever work takes place, while providing a unified approach to securing the modern workspace.
Rethinking Security for Hybrid Work
Traditional approaches to securing hybrid work, including deploying multiple cloud-delivered SASE and SSE solutions, often require significant infrastructure, specialized expertise, and ongoing operational overhead to deploy and manage. These models can increase cost and complexity while still leaving gaps in visibility and control where modern work now happens.
Sophos Workspace Protection takes a different approach by securing the workspace directly, eliminating the need to backhaul traffic through centralized infrastructure. This reduces the operational burden and cost while enabling protections that follow users, applications, their internet usage, and their data wherever they work, providing organizations at all stages of security maturity with a simpler way to secure hybrid work without added complexity.
At the core of Sophos Workspace Protection is the Sophos Protected Browser, powered by Island and purpose-built to seamlessly integrate with the Sophos Central platform. With 85% of the modern workday now taking place in a web browser, the Sophos Protected Browser was developed to address security needs where modern work happens.1 It provides organizations with visibility and control at the workspace level, helping them protect sensitive data, manage application access, and enforce policy directly within the browser. By embedding security controls into a familiar user experience, Sophos Workspace Protection enables organizations to secure work across corporate and remote environments without disrupting productivity.
“Security teams are increasingly impacted by complexity, especially as hybrid work, SaaS adoption, and AI tools continue to expand the workspace,” said Mike Jude, Research Director at IDC. “Sophos Workspace Protection reflects a pragmatic shift in the market delivering core SASE and SSE outcomes through an integrated, endpoint‑ and browser‑centric approach that simplifies deployment, reduces operational overhead, and helps organizations govern application and AI use without adding another layer of infrastructure.”
Governing Shadow IT and Shadow AI
As emerging technologies, including generative AI, become part of everyday workflows, organizations are increasingly challenged to understand how these tools are being used and what data is being shared through them. Recent research shows that more than half of employees worldwide now use AI tools at work, often before formal policies or controls are established, increasing risks associated with Shadow IT and Shadow AI.2 By providing visibility and control at the workspace level, Sophos Workspace Protection helps organizations assess risk, enforce policy, and govern the safe use of emerging technologies across the hybrid workforce.
What’s Included in Sophos Workspace Protection
Sophos Workspace Protection is delivered as a flexible set of integ