Allowing secure external access.

["Shaolin Tiger" <shaolin () shaolin-tiger com>]

Hi all,

Just a quick query really..I'm pretty new to allowing people to come in from
outside, I usually spend most of my time trying to stop them ;)

I need to allow access to our internal database and application to the sales
manager who spends all his time outside..

I have an IPCop firewall which I believe has some VPN support, but only
supports end to end connections, like 1 IPCop box to another, as far as I
can understand from reading the docs.

I know in 2k and XP you can choose VPN when creating a new connection in
network settings and enter a server IP but I don't think this would work
with the IPCop machine.

The sales guy will be using an XP laptop.

The other option I thought of is having a dedicated machine inside using VNC
or something and a port forward, but I don't think this is very secure.

We do have terminal services on our PDC but it is allready overloaded and I
wouldn't wish to put this extra burden on it...it may just give up.

What other options do I have? Preferably free, or cheap and secure to put my
mind at rest opening up a hole in the firewall.

Any suggestions appreciated.

Shaolin

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