Keep Your Data Home: Secure Access With Reverse Tunnel

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Your data doesn't have to move to be useful. 

For years, organisations have faced a quiet but persistent frustration: their most valuable data lives behind firewalls, tucked inside private networks and on-premises databases places the cloud simply can't reach without opening doors that security teams rightly don't want opened. 

There are approaches, but existing approaches came with operational trade-offs. Opening firewall ports increased exposure. IP whitelisting required continuous maintenance. Even cloud provider native solutions like Private Link, while powerful for certain architectures, introduced infrastructure complexity and scaling considerations that made them less practical for organisations integrating multiple data sources across hybrid and on-premises environments. 

The gap remained: a need for secure, maintainable, cost-effective data access that didn't require extensive network re-architecture,.So the data stayed put. Or it got copied, moved, and transformed, adding cost, complexity, and risk along the way. 

There's a better way. One that keeps your data secure, your network intact, and your infrastructure simple. 

Introducing Reverse Tunnel for Workflow Data Fabric 

Reverse Tunnel is a new capability in Workflow Data Fabric that lets your Zero Copy Connectors reach private and on-premises data sources without opening a single inbound firewall port. 

No exposure. No compromise. No moving your data. 

How it works without the jargon 

Think of it like a secure, two-way conversation that your network starts. A lightweight relay, deployed inside your private network, establishes a secure tunnel to the ServiceNow gateway. Workflow Data Fabric then queries your data source through this tunnel, with encryption maintained throughout your data never leaves unencrypted. 

Your data stays where it is. Your firewall stays closed. Your team stays in control. 

What this means for your organisation 

Whether your data lives in an on-premises database, a private cloud environment, or a VPC, Reverse Tunnel makes it accessible to the full power of Workflow Data Fabric without asking your infrastructure team to compromise on security. 

For the teams managing connectivity, setup is familiar. The relay works like a MID Server in placement, deploy it where your data lives, register it with your instance, configure your connector, and you're ready to connect. 

For the teams consuming data, nothing changes. Zero Copy Connectors work exactly as they always have. Once configured, the tunnel operates in the background with no performance degradation, no new operational burden. 

Built for Enterprise Reality

The best AI and analytics are only as good as the data feeding them. Enterprise data lives in legacy systems, private data centre, and cloud silos and much of it remains disconnected from the tools that could unlock its value. Not because organisations don't want to connect it. But because traditional approaches require difficult choices: compromise on security, add operational complexity, or accept that some data stays siloed. 

Most enterprise data isn't in the cloud. It's in carefully guarded environments that exist for good reason. Reverse Tunnel doesn't ask you to change that. It meets your data where it is securely, simply, without the trade-offs. 

Reverse Tunnel is available now as part of the Australia release of Workflow Data Fabric.