Ever since I can remember, all descriptions I have heard or read about an “office of the future” included a common attribute. The future office is always, without fail, paperless.

No paper is needed in the mythical office of the future because all information there is managed and stored in digital format. That sounds completely plausible to us because the technology to do that exists right now.

Unfortunately instead of using less paper, today’s offices use a lot more paper than offices did when people first started talking about a “paperless office”.

Why quit paper?

We can think of a million reasons why every organization should ditch paper and go totally digital with their information. Among the most obvious:

• Digital is more secure than paper
• It’s simpler to back up
• It’s more convenient to store
• It’s infinitely easier to share with collaborators
• It can be updated pretty much in real time
• It’s much more environmentally friendly.

All those and more are good reasons for organizations to be totally digital. But let’s face it. There are also specific circumstances when digital is NOT better than a paper document. I’m specifically thinking of me (located in the U.S.) trying to calculate and file my income taxes every January/February.

In that instance, paper is definitely preferable because, for me, the good old “paper trail” has no easily accessed digital equivalent.

While we’re not perceptively closer to achieving the paperless office, there is some good news. According to Aeon, we hit Peak Paper in 2013 and worldwide usage has been slowly trending down ever since.

But even so, Wired magazine said of global paper usage a couple years ago:

• Each day, one billion photocopies are made.
• The annual growth rate for the amount of paper produced by the average company is 25 percent.
• There are over four trillion paper documents in the US alone, and this number is growing at a rate of 22%, or roughly 880 billion paper documents a year. 

Why can’t we quit paper?

So why is it so hard for individuals and organizations to give up using paper, even when we know with certainty that doing so makes complete sense?

Surprisingly, there are a lot of reasons. They may not all apply to every person or  business, but they have enough collective appeal to us that humans are unable to let paper go.

• Paper is versatile. There are few restrictions on how we can put it to use.
• It’s universally accessible.
• It’s inexpensive.
• Under all but extreme conditions, it’s easy for most humans to consume paper-based communications.
• Paper is extremely easy to use. No training needed.
• It’s mobile.
• It’s easily held and manipulated.
• It does not cause eye fatigue like digital device screens can.
• Unlike with digital devices, paper’s creative space is also the storage location for that which is created.
• It’s tactile, has texture and a dimensionality not available from the glass screen of an electronic device.
• It’s made from renewable resources.
• There’s never a need to find a power source to recharge a battery. 

And finally, if humans become frustrated we can get temporary emotional release by tearing paper to shreds, or crumpling it and throwing the wad across the room. Try that with your computing device.

It’s fair to say that digital devices share some of the above attributes, but certainly not all.

There’s more to the dump-paper story

Another, less discussed topic related to giving up paper usage is this: Simply going digital doesn’t solve an organization’s information management issues. Which issues am I talking about? Here are just a few:

• securely storing documents and files
• tagging, organizing and indexing stored documents in a strategic way
• searching archives of stored documents and producing accurate search results
• retrieving only those files that are needed and . . . 
• . . . only WHEN they are needed.

Moving an organization’s paper-based information management bad habits to the cloud just makes it easier to continue engaging in those bad habits. It also will continue producing the poor outcomes that those bad habits produce.

It’s been rightly pointed out by many others that rising generations are more digitally oriented and comfortable with less paper use. It’s probably up to them to solve our paper-usage conundrum. 

The paperless office? It’s not arriving any time soon. A more realistic goal for individuals and organizations is reducing our paper use. Minimizing paper consumption by better storing and managing information is not just realistic, it’s absolutely doable. And that’s something we can all get behind.

It’s tempting to think of corporate security mostly in terms of locking things down: restricting access, closing loopholes, patching vulnerabilities. Those are the necessary steps you take to reduce potential exploits before they happen.

Another crucial aspect of security is oversight. That’s a more active, interventional way to catch suspicious activity.

To give an example, your car has locks on its doors. But those locks don’t care who’s using the keys. The pivotal moment comes when an observer says, “Hey, that’s Jeff’s car. So why is that stranger unlocking it? I’d better figure out what’s going on.”

The same applies to corporate printing. An employee might have perfectly legitimate access to a certain printer. Yet, if you notice them printing unusually large jobs at odd hours, something could definitely be amiss. That’s where oversight comes into play.

Through centralized print administration, your organization can get the unified oversight it needs to create a more efficient and secure printing environment. Centralization doesn’t just tighten control. It also offers easier print monitoring in even the most distributed organizations.

How serverless printing enables centralized print administration

PrinterLogic’s serverless printing infrastructure allows you to centralize print administration in your organization while eliminating print servers at the same time. That means more oversight with less infrastructure.

How does our next-gen enterprise software do this? By moving beyond traditional approaches to corporate printing. Instead of relying on print servers to do the heavy lifting, PrinterLogic establishes direct IP connections between clients and printers. The web-based admin console then lets authorized IT staff manage all of those printer objects and settings from a single pane of glass.

Using the console, admins can update (or roll back) drivers and configure changes directly on user endpoints. With print servers eliminated, those changes can be carried out in real time. Furthermore, printing is more robust when it’s based on direct IP, and centralized management makes the entire environment feel much more cohesive—even if it’s a broad mix of printers and client devices.

Increased visibility through advanced reporting

In addition to its powerful admin console, PrinterLogic also offers advanced reporting. This is a print auditing and monitoring feature that increases visibility over the entire corporate printing environment.

Advanced reporting enhances centralized print administration by keeping tabs on things like print job metadata and SNMP status. That information gives admins a better understanding of how often printers are being used and for what. They can see details right down to the user and printer level.

What’s more, PrinterLogic makes that data accessible as well as actionable. Print job metadata can be integrated with your organization’s existing BI tools, and information on consumables usage or print activity can be emailed to department heads and decision-makers at specified intervals. You can use it to curb wasteful printing or as the basis for a secure printing initiative.

Secure release printing with PrinterLogic

Of course, any secure printing initiative ought to include secure release printing. The Secure Print Analysis report from HP found that almost 90 percent of enterprise businesses have suffered at least one data loss because of unsecured printing. Secure release printing helps to combat data loss by adding an authentication step to some or all print jobs.

PrinterLogic makes it super easy for organizations to incorporate that into their corporate printing strategy. Any network printer—even legacy devices—can be configured for secure release printing in PrinterLogic’s admin control. And for even more convenience, there’s the option to use multiple release methods: PrinterLogic’s Print Release App, badge/card release, the printer’s control panel and more.

More oversight, more control, less effort

Iowa’s Northwest Area Education Agency (AEA) turned to PrinterLogic SaaS when it wanted a single cloud-based solution that would do all of the above. That meant centralizing print administration, leveraging advanced reporting and implementing secure printing in a mixed-OS environment.

With print servers and conventional direct IP, those targets were impossible. But with PrinterLogic, Northwest AEA was able to hit every one of them. The organization now has more oversight and more control over its print environment—but with far less investment of time and resources in day-to-day print administration. You can read the case study here.

Thanks to the increased adoption of serverless printing, companies now have real choice when it comes to picking the perfect print-management solution.

For many years, conventional direct IP printing or print servers were the default approaches to print infrastructure. Each of those legacy models has limitations on how the print environment can be managed.

Recently, more and more organizations have recognized the power and flexibility of a serverless print infrastructure like PrinterLogic. That’s opened up new possibilities for print management as well as enterprise printing as a whole. Here are some things to consider when determining the right solution for your organization.

Pinpoint where print management needs to improve

Before deciding on the ideal print management solution for your company, there are some important things to consider. You can better identify these by taking a cold, hard look at your company’s print environment and listing the major pain points in your enterprise printing. Here are some questions to ask yourself:

Can your existing print management solution scale?

With traditional direct IP printing, print management rapidly becomes unsustainable. Changes to printers and settings have to be performed for each machine. Print servers, on the other hand, usually require more and more infrastructure as your company grows.

How much time should IT be spending on print management?

Print-related support often makes up a disproportionate amount of the total helpdesk tickets. Things like printer installation and basic print troubleshooting eat up a lot of IT’s time and resources. That’s true for both conventional direct IP printing and print servers.

Is there untapped potential for optimization?

Enterprise print environments are notoriously inefficient. Legacy printers exist alongside feature-rich newer models. Expensive, high-maintenance server infrastructure accumulates over time. Users might not always print to the closest device, and they can develop wasteful habits toward consumables like paper and toner.

Are we getting the most bang for our buck?

Many organizations have a wishlist of enterprise printing functionality—features like secure release printing, mobile/BYOD printing and advanced reporting. Unfortunately, these features never get rolled out because they’re incompatible with certain devices or too resource-intensive.

Superior print management starts with infrastructure

At the end of the day, the potential of your print management solution will depend on your current print infrastructure. Traditional direct IP printing doesn’t lend itself to at-a-glance oversight and convenient management. And print servers, whether they’re distributed or consolidated, are high-maintenance single points of failure.

A serverless print infrastructure like PrinterLogic moves beyond those drawbacks, making streamlined print management a natural extension of streamlined printing. The scalability, ease of use, efficiency and cost-effectiveness that elude legacy enterprise printing solutions are suddenly within reach.

Among tons of other benefits, PrinterLogic’s unique combination of next-gen direct IP printing and centralized print management:

• unifies print management (including driver management) in a single console
• enhances both management and deployment of printer objects
• eliminates print servers and their unnecessary infrastructure
• reduces the number of printer-related issues, easing the burden on the IT team 
• optimizes the printing workflow while adding resiliency to everyday printing
• increases visibility into the entire print environment
• simplifies the implementation of optional enterprise printing features like secure release or BYOD printing
• empowers end users to safely install printers themselves
• helps organizations rein in excessive print costs through reporting and auditing

Those are exactly the results that Physician Partners of America experienced after moving to PrinterLogic. Using our serverless print infrastructure and its incredible print management, they’ve been able to grow through acquisition and even migrate their workstation environment more smoothly. Read the case study here.

Switch to a serverless print infrastructure in under a week

PrinterLogic’s automated migration process can help your company switch to serverless printing quickly and seamlessly. One survey showed that close to 70% of our customers were enjoying robust enterprise printing and effortless print management within a single work week.

Corporate printing can pose any number of security risks if it’s not managed correctly.

These risks include:

• Unauthorized access to administration settings: GPOs and rights management can be hard to dial in, which might lead admins to loosen access to upper-level management settings. Unfortunately, that’s like leaving your keys in the door for the sake of convenience.
• Limited network visibility and control: Protecting data isn’t just about restricting access to files or settings. Without unified oversight, it’s tough for IT to keep tabs on print activity. That makes it harder for them to identify weak points or emerging threats in the print environment.
• Printer hacking via the Internet/network: It’s not unusual for printers to be deployed with open ports and their factory settings unchanged—even in corporate printing scenarios. That’s how one white-hat hacker compromised 150,000 printers with a simple script in 2017.
• Confidential information being left on printer trays: Around 14% of printed documents go unclaimed. When those documents contain sensitive information, it doesn’t take a tech mastermind to get a hold of them. They can be picked up by anyone who walks past.

Insecure printing can wreak havoc

When no secure print strategy is in place, one or more of these vulnerabilities can be exploited. The potential effects are threefold:

1. Legal issues: Depending on what kind of information is exposed, individuals and third parties can claim injury. That opens up the possibility of an expensive—and public—court battle.
2. Regulatory fines: Many industries are subject to regulations on data protection or employee and customer privacy. Healthcare and protected health information (PHI) is one prominent example. Failure to comply with those regulations can lead to hefty fines.
3. Loss of consumer confidence: Data breaches are also breaches of customer and partner trust. Companies face serious public backlash, boycotts and a lasting damage to their reputation if they allow sensitive info to leak.

On average, the aggregate cost of each corporate printing data breach is estimated to be $400,000 per organization. IBM Security’s Cost of a Data Breach Report for 2019 puts that figure closer to $4 million.

Eliminate print servers and secure your print environment

PrinterLogic’s serverless printing infrastructure enables your organization to eliminate print servers, which reduces the attack surface of your corporate printing environment. What’s more, PrinterLogic makes it easy for organizations to implement secure release printing and other features to protect print-related data.

Here’s how PrinterLogic addresses each of the risks cited above:

• Tighter control, more flexibility: Along with eliminating print servers, PrinterLogic eliminates the need for GPOs and finicky rights management. That means you can grant printer installation privileges to the helpdesk and non-admin IT staff without compromising security.
• Centralized management: PrinterLogic’s web-based admin console allows you to oversee and control the entire print environment from a single pane of glass. That gives you at-a-glance visibility over printer settings and print jobs—even in distributed organizations.
• Print auditing: In conjunction with its centralized management, PrinterLogic’s advanced reporting lets you proactively monitor the print environment for suspicious print jobs and rogue copy, scan and print activity.
• Secure release printing: Any secure print strategy should include this feature. It holds print jobs on the workstation they originated from until users authenticate at a printer using a release mechanism like a PrinterLogic Control Panel Application or our Print Release App for iOS and Android.

Increased efficiency and security—with proven results

Its combined ability to eliminate print servers while hardening print security has made PrinterLogic a top pick among many managed print services providers.

The Dublin, Ireland-based Independent Photocopier Services (IPS) chose PrinterLogic for those very reasons. Now they can offer their corporate printing customers secure print functionality and more efficient print management with a single solution. Read the case study here.

What’s worse than a print job that takes ages to get to the printer? Your employees probably have an answer or two. For most people, slow network printing ranks up there with root canals and being stuck in a long line at airport security as their flight is boarding.

Although slow printing speeds usually result in end users reaching out for printer support, most of the blame falls squarely on the print server. Or, more accurately, the server-based printing model. When print servers are consolidated, every client ends up routing their print jobs through that one node. That puts a lot of burden on one device. It also puts a lot of strain on the WAN connection for remote branches. But a distributed server configuration isn’t a surefire solution to sluggish speeds. Heavy network traffic from non-print-related activity can impact print jobs too.

Temporary fixes to slow network printing

Before you begin, ask yourself this: Is the slow network printing your end users are experiencing associated with a specific printer make or model? If so, your fix might not be at the server level. Try individual printer support first.

However, if all of your print jobs feel like they’re moving through molasses, there are some potential—albeit temporary—fixes.

• Adjust configurations in the print server: If the option is available, choose “Print directly to server” or similar. This will bypass spooling, yet its viability will depend a lot on your print environment (e.g., server OS, user count).
• Use a dedicated disk drive for spooling: Is your spooler sharing storage with other applications? The speed of the hard drive could be bottlenecking more than just printing performance. Using an SSD might add a welcome speed boost.
• Increase the hard disk space of the print server: Storage constraints could be limiting the overall performance of your print server. If you have control over the storage configuration, try adding to total available space.
• Use discrete print servers: Sometimes organizations have their servers perform multiple duties at the same time. That might be economical, but it can lead to those separate functions battling for hardware resources.
• Minimize print drivers: Print drivers are notorious for causing far-reaching, hard-to-pinpoint issues. Best practices in any print environment recommend paring down the number of drivers to reduce conflicts.

In the off chance you overlooked important software updates, also be sure to check if there’s a new patch available for your server OS version. That might get rid of a few bugs that are causing slow print speeds.

Of course, all of these tips assume that your IT services are based in-house. Companies that rely on managed print services might have to reach out to their provider.

The permanent fix to slow network printing

Whether you’re an SMB with one office, a massive enterprise with global reach or a managed print services provider, PrinterLogic provides a single, comprehensive solution to slow network printing. Its serverless printing infrastructure removes the common culprit—namely, the print server—once and for all.

PrinterLogic:

• Eliminates print servers: Consolidated or distributed, print servers are often at the root of sluggish print speeds. Not to mention a host of other problems. PrinterLogic’s centrally managed, direct IP architecture is truly serverless.
• Reduces print infrastructure: Getting rid of print servers doesn’t just result in speedier printing. It also means there’s less to maintain, less to upgrade, less to oversee. That smaller footprint saves time and costs in both the short and long term.
• Optimizes printing: Direct IP routes print jobs straight from the computer to the printer. In addition to being efficient, that keeps print jobs safely on the local network. They don’t have to cross the WAN to a remote print server.

It solves even more printing problems

The benefits of PrinterLogic don’t stop with improving the speed and efficiency of network printing. Thanks to its superior print management, organizations can reduce the time they’re spending on printer support as well.

When Conversant Group, an IT consulting and security company specializing in the legal industry, wanted to streamline print management and boost the speed of network printing (among many other things) in its Citrix VDI environments, PrinterLogic provided the solution.

PrinterLogic’s web-based admin console made it easier for Conversant Group to provide managed print services to its customers. The company saw a huge drop in print-related support tickets. Plus it did what some considered impossible: It eliminated print servers from complex Citrix environments. Read the case study here.

From an IT standpoint, healthcare environments can be more complex than many other industries. Medical staff often work in shifts, putting in long and irregular hours. Frontline medical professionals like doctors and nurses also tend to be highly mobile.

That can make it hard for IT to ensure that they always have quick and seamless access to the resources they need.

But there’s at least one additional IT challenge that the healthcare industry grapples with, and that’s secure medical printing. Electronic medical (or health) records, or EMR/EHR for short, have to be treated with the utmost confidentiality—especially when they make the leap from digital to paper. If a healthcare organization is found to violate the strict regulations governing protected health information (PHI), it can face steep fines or severe penalties.

As healthcare companies like Navicent Health can tell you, all of that makes routine print management incredibly difficult.

Serverless printing can increase security and efficiency

PrinterLogic has helped Navicent Health and many other organizations in the healthcare industry overcome those issues. Our serverless printing infrastructure provided the complete solution to their ongoing problems with secure medical printing as well as day-to-day print management. It’s enabled them to improve their printing strategies and deliver better patient care.

Here’s a quick breakdown of the benefits that PrinterLogic’s serverless printing offers medical practices and other healthcare organizations.

• Protecting patient privacy: PrinterLogic brings secure release printing functionality to any network printer, even legacy devices. Using this feature, medical staff and admin staff can safeguard PHI by authenticating at the printer before their sensitive documents are printed. That’s cost-effective, convenient and, above all, secure.
• Increasing staff mobility: It’s easy to streamline clinical workflows through PrinterLogic’s mobile printing capabilities. No matter where they happen to be, medical professionals can print natively to authorized printers from their iOS or Android smartphones and tablets. BYOD and guest users are supported too.
• Reducing the burden on the helpdesk: Serverless printing isn’t only more secure than traditional print-server-based architectures. It’s also more reliable. PrinterLogic leverages direct IP to route print jobs straight to printers, increasing speed as well as simplicity. The result is that end users spend far less time on the phone with the helpdesk.
• Cutting IT costs: Eliminating print servers is the ideal way to shrink your print infrastructure—and PrinterLogic is the way to achieve that without sacrificing functionality. Serverless printing removes print servers’ single points of failure and their expensive upkeep. At the same time, PrinterLogic introduces more flexibility and scalability.
• Empowering end users: One of the biggest print management headaches is printer installation. PrinterLogic’s self-service printer installation portal puts that power safely in the hands of end users. Medical staff can then identify and install nearby printers with a single click.
• Identifying print-related expenditures: Advanced reporting is an easy way to get a fix on the finer points of your print environment. With it, you can put a dollar amount to individual or departmental usage of consumables like toner and paper. It even integrates with your existing SNMP and BI tools.
• Monitoring and auditing print activity: Keeping a watchful eye on print jobs and printer access is a big part of any secure medical printing strategy. PrinterLogic allows admins to view print activity right down to the printer and user level to ensure compliance with PHI requirements.

Works seamlessly with Citrix, MEDITECH, Cerner and more

Healthcare organizations often have dedicated software solutions in place for their EMR/EHR printing. MEDITECH is one of them, and it requires print servers for its secure medical printing. Yet PrinterLogic is versatile enough to simplify print management in MEDITECH environments, not to mention environments that use Citrix, Cerner and other solutions that can add layers of complexity to printing.

Edgewood Healthcare was no exception. Their environment makes use of VPN connections to 60 distributed locations. On top of that, they use web-based ResiDex software for their EMR printing. By migrating to serverless printing through PrinterLogic, Edgewood eliminated close to 30 print servers, centralized direct IP printer deployments and reduced the number of print-related support tickets by around 95%. You can read the case study here.

As cloud adoption gains a bigger foothold in the enterprise, security remains a major concern.

A survey conducted by Techvangelism on behalf of the privileged access management provider Centrify found that 60% of businesses identified security as the top challenge for their cloud-migration projects. In its 2019 Guardians of the Cloud report, data security company Bitglass reported that 93% of its survey respondents worried about their ability to use the cloud securely.

Corporate printing and print management is no exception. Organizations that are considering moving their print infrastructure to the cloud have security front of mind. And for good reason. The risks the print environment poses to data loss shouldn’t be underestimated.

PrinterLogic SaaS, our cloud-based serverless printing infrastructure, addresses that widespread need. It’s the most secure enterprise-class print management solution you can find. That’s a big claim, but it’s one that’s supported by a robust architecture and multiple secure printing features.

What makes PrinterLogic SaaS inherently secure?

The cloud instance of PrinterLogic SaaS is hosted with AWS. As part of that, PrinterLogic has been recognized as an AWS Advanced Technology Partner that has passed the AWS Well-Architected review for security, performance and resiliency. So PrinterLogic SaaS is not only in compliance with AWS best practices, it also inherits all of the benefits of AWS cloud security.

Beyond that, PrinterLogic SaaS itself is built on a unique centrally managed direct IP model. By routing print jobs straight from the client to the printer, it keeps print traffic on the local network. Most cloud printing solutions require the print jobs to cross the WAN, which creates intercept points for malicious actors.

At the same time, PrinterLogic SaaS allows for print management from a single pane of glass. That allows for better oversight and control of the entire print environment.

PrinterLogic’s direct IP model also eliminates the need for print servers. These have been the de facto standard in corporate printing for years, and yet by design they add to an organization’s attack surface. Spooled print jobs and shared print queues create a rich target for someone who might be looking to steal sensitive data. And let’s not even get started here on print servers’ many print management headaches.

Additional secure printing features

That secure platform is augmented by several important features and integrations.

One of the most recent enhancements to PrinterLogic SaaS is integration with Okta and Azure AD. Using one of these popular cloud identity providers (IdPs), organizations can synchronize user-identity information with PrinterLogic SaaS for System for Cross-domain Identity Management (SCIM) provisioning. That allows for more flexible authorization controls and as well as more robust user authentication for secure release printing through single sign-on (SSO) and multi-factor authentication (MFA). 

On that note: PrinterLogic SaaS supports multiple release options for secure printing. Depending on your company’s preferred approach to print management, end users can authenticate with any of the following methods:

• PrinterLogic’s Print Release App: Android and iOS users can conveniently use their smartphones to view, manage and release secure print jobs to authorized printers.
• PrinterLogic Release Portal: Using their Active Directory or IdP credentials, users can log in to a web-based portal via a workstation or even a dedicated tablet device. They can then release one or more jobs to a destination printer.
• ID card or badge: Organizations that use physical ID systems can require users to swipe their badge through an associated reader. This reader can be a standalone device or integrated into the printer itself.
• Control Panel Application (CPA): This involves entering credentials on the printer’s embedded touchscreen. CPA authentication can also be combined with badge authentication for an extra layer of security.

PrinterLogic SaaS already leverages the benefits of our all-new Control Panel Platform, which is bringing native CPAs to every major printer brand used in corporate printing: Canon, Sharp, HP and Xerox—with Konica-Minolta, Ricoh and Lexmark coming soon. These latest-gen applications are more responsive, more consistent and more intuitive than ever before. They embody our philosophy that secure printing needs to be user-friendly in order to be as effective as possible.

PrinterLogic SaaS is uniquely secure

On top of all this, PrinterLogic SaaS is the only print management solution that’s been certified for compliance with stringent U.S. government security standards. It also offers secure-release printing that’s administered from a cloud-based console, but keeps all print jobs local and does not require any print-server infrastructure.

Just as PrinterLogic SaaS is designed to take the risk out of corporate printing, we try to remove the unknowns from migrating to PrinterLogic SaaS. 

Almost a decade ago, my Co-Founder and I established PrinterLogic with the mission to eliminate print servers off the face of the earth. Between our work and the general advancement of enterprise IT architectures, eliminating print servers from any modern IT environment has become table stakes and we’re proud to be the clear market leader in our space. 

In 2016, we introduced the concept of a Serverless Printing Infrastructure (SPI) via a modern SaaS deployment. The SPI model not only eliminates print servers, it eliminates all servers needed for an enterprise print management architecture and enhances the capabilities of your current printing infrastructure. By doing this we set a new standard for enterprise print management and established the core requirements to implement a serverless printing infrastructure. A true SPI solution must include the following:

• Modern SaaS architecture
• Seamless IT infrastructure integration
• User-Based Security
• Off-Network/Zero Trust Worker Enablement

The details in the delivery of each of these components will play a critical role in your ability to successfully bring a modern serverless printing infrastructure to your business. Some of these attributes provide long-established core functionality, others update your print infrastructure to keep pace with your current IT strategy, and many will future-proof your print management investment well into the coming years.

Over the next couple of months–through blogs, podcasts, videos, and slides–I’ll detail the key tenets of each SPI component through my own thought leadership as well as interviews with industry experts and top PrinterLogic leaders. I look forward to engaging with your questions and challenges as we outline the SPI components and clearly define the standards of a modern direct IP enterprise print management platform.

With the sudden increase in remote work due to COVID-19, it’s more important than ever for organizations to have an easy, cost-effective and secure way for their home-based users to print.

Traditionally, a virtual private network (VPN) has been the standard approach to accommodate remote workers. A VPN enables them to connect securely to the organization’s internal network. The problem with VPNs is that it’s often difficult for remote or mobile users to set them up. Usually they have to rely on IT to configure their machines. Throughput speeds can be slower with VPNs too, which can be frustrating.

VPNs also don’t solve a lot of remote and mobile printing challenges. It’s not easy for IT to grant remote workers access to new printers or install those printers remotely. Nor does IT have much visibility into what confidential documents users might be printing at home.

Thanks to PrinterLogic’s serverless print infrastructure, printing without a VPN is not only possible, it’s also easy, secure and affordable. With our cloud-based solution, PrinterLogic SaaS, organizations can:

1. Protect documents and data

Powerful print auditing and reporting features keep IT apprised of print activity. And PrinterLogic’s secure print functionality comes in handy for those occasions when remote workers come into the office and need to print. They can release secure print jobs right from their smartphones or directly on the printer’s control panel.

2. Support seamless remote and mobile printing

PrinterLogic SaaS allows remote employees to print to any authorized printers—whether that’s at their home office or at a branch location using their BYOD smartphone. To take advantage of PrinterLogic’s mobile printing, there’s zero client-side software for admins or users to install.

3. Centrally manage printing remotely

A unique combination of centralized management and direct IP printing makes PrinterLogic SaaS ideal for busy admins. They can easily oversee and control all printer objects across the extended print environment. The PrinterLogic desktop client even lets admins monitor and manage home-based printers.

Eliminate print servers, eliminate VPNs

Many organizations turn to PrinterLogic to eliminate print servers from their enterprise print infrastructure. But the full benefits of serverless printing become apparent at a time like this, when employees who are normally on-prem find themselves working from home.

PrinterLogic SaaS enables IT to respond smoothly to a sudden change like that. How? Because serverless printing can scale and adapt quickly. New printers can be added, deployments can be altered (yes, PrinterLogic eliminates GPOs too) and print-related configurations can be adjusted with ease. And admins can do it all from a single pane of glass.

Yet that incredible flexibility doesn’t mean sacrificing security. In fact, PrinterLogic SaaS is more secure, as print jobs don’t need to be routed to a print server. That’s why other cloud printing solutions aren’t capable of printing without a VPN. PrinterLogic’s robust direct IP architecture routes print jobs straight from the workstation to the destination printer. 

All that doesn’t just help to secure print jobs. It also increases the speed and reliability of remote, VDI and mobile printing. Plus, by reducing print infrastructure and the need for complex VPNs, PrinterLogic SaaS saves money and hassle several times over. 

Support seamless remote printing today

Tazergy is a managed services provider that specializes in senior-living facilities. They support more than 150 customer locations with a huge array of individual printers across the United States. Using PrinterLogic SaaS, they’re able to provide end users with intuitive BYOD and mobile printing while managing it all from one console. Read the case study here. This white paper has even more useful details on the power and versatility of PrinterLogic SaaS.

The complexity of technology and the speed at which it’s evolving have a big impact on our lives. Not only do we have more powerful devices on our desks and in our pockets, those digital devices are more integral to everything we do. That ups the risk of sensitive information getting exposed to outsiders.

To safeguard against accidental and intentional data breaches, organizations need to tighten the screws on their print environment. That’s something they can do through features like secure printing. The only problem is that improving print security means sinking even more time and effort into print management.

Actually, that’s no longer the case. With the right serverless print infrastructure, you can harden your print security while spending less time on printer support. All it takes is PrinterLogic and this four-part strategy.

1. Monitor print data through auditing

Thanks to its integrated advanced reporting capabilities, PrinterLogic allows admins to see exactly who printed what, when and where. It can also help identify the devices and users that printed confidential files. 

By conducting audits of print activity, any out-of-compliance issues can be quickly identified and corrected. The associated reporting can also be used as a cost-saving mechanism to keep consumables usage in check, which is exactly what Epic Management, LP did. (Read the case study here.

2. Integrate AAA with printing

Nope, AAA doesn’t stand for the American Automobile Association. (Although we do have a great case study for AAA Carolinas that you should check out.) Here it means authorization, authentication and accountability. 

PrinterLogic SaaS integrates with Active Directory as well as cloud-based identity providers (IdPs) like Okta and Azure AD. That makes it easy to configure printing authorizations. You can also configure any network printer—even legacy devices—for secure release printing. Combined with accountability through auditing, you score the AAA hat trick with minimal effort.

3. Reduce your attack surface

An attack surface is really just the sum total of all the possible data entry and extraction points in your IT environment. Legacy printing solutions like print servers increase your attack surface. When they spool print jobs, they create a convenient attack vector for malicious actors. Print jobs that cross the WAN to a remote print server create even more intercept points.

PrinterLogic’s serverless print infrastructure changes all that. By leveraging direct IP printing, it ensures that print jobs only travel between the client and the printer. That keeps print jobs off shared servers and also prevents those jobs from crossing the WAN.

4. Employ strong management solutions

Secure printing is augmented by solid print management. A unified window onto the print environment and intuitive control over default printer settings and other configurations can help admins lock down unsecured areas. PrinterLogic’s centralized admin console does just that.

But efficient print management can help in other ways. For instance, Hunton & Williams LLP used PrinterLogic’s mobile printing to support guest printers and keep visitors off the primary Wi-Fi network. And they didn’t have to pour tons of resources into setting it up. (Read the case study here.)

Enjoy secure, streamlined printing

Want to eliminate print servers, secure your printing, and streamline printer support? PrinterLogic’s serverless print infrastructure gives you the ability to ditch your print servers, implement secure printing and optimize your print management—all with a single, simple solution.