Secure Cloud Printing and Imaging

Read Intel IT’s best practices for implementing secure cloud printing in its private cloud.

Intel employees expect easy-to-use, seamless and effective printing. Intel IT has the responsibility to find the most cost-effective, secure and technically viable solution. Marrying these two goals is an art, and Intel IT’s best practices can demystify this process, provide insights about the selection of devices, help evaluate different modes of ownership and balance user and business needs.

Our printing and scanning services have evolved over time. Initially, we used a decentralized management model. To improve efficiency, we adopted a more centralized model, where Intel IT, not the business units, procured and managed devices. More recently, we have implemented a highly secure, private-cloud-based model and work with a single vendor to manage the devices and services.

This secure, cloud-based managed print services (MPS) model provides the following benefits:

• Reduction in the overall cost of printing at Intel.
• Maintained security of Intel’s information and intellectual property.
• Greatly enhanced, consistent user experience.
• Improved transparency.
• Reduced personnel, added security and support.

In addition, the MPS model brings Intel closer to “The Workplace of the Future,” with greener printing policies. Indicators show that Intel’s imaging solutions are significantly above the industry average from a green computing perspective. Intel is well on its way to achieving a paperless office and has reduced the number of printouts per year by nearly half since 2015.

Mapping print jobs to the cloud and retrieving documents is easy. Instead of mapping to a specific printer, users map to the print cloud and retrieve documents from any Intel printer. The cloud stores documents for up to one business day. If jobs are not retrieved during that period, the MPS system sends employees two deletion confirmation emails, and then if the print job is still not retrieved, it is automatically deleted from the cloud.

Cloud printing is secure because employees must use a form of identification to initiate printing. Originally, PINs were required to release print jobs. Today, employees authenticate their identity by swiping their ID badge in a badge reader to access print and scan jobs. Intel employees are required to wear their identification badge at all times. Using the badge reader to access print jobs not only makes it convenient to retrieve jobs from any printer, it also adds an additional layer of security. Specific security and privacy parameters are defined for each employee in accordance with our worldwide privacy policy.

Moving forward, we will continually analyze data from all printing and imaging devices to gain insights about printing behaviors across the enterprise. We will strive to fine-tune the MPS model and policies to improve cost and efficiency even more. As we continue to explore ways to reduce overheads and increase efficiency, we are evaluating MPS deployment to a public cloud. This will require us to evaluate the user experience, security requirements and cost benefits as well as other factors.