Posted by Devin Anderson
Many of our enterprise customers praise PrinterLogic for its astounding ease of use—especially when it comes to their employees’ printing experience. Which is to say, those employees click “Print” and their document is instantly queued and printed at the correct printer. No cryptic errors, no jobs that mysteriously vanish into the ether. That’s exactly how they expect it to be. Which is exactly how it should be.
When it comes to security, though, that effortlessness can pose a risk. It’s like letting your web browser store all your login credentials. Sure, it makes things more convenient, but it opens up the possibility for exploitation too. That’s why two-step verification—whereby a website will immediately follow your login attempt with a time-limited security code that only you can access—has started to become common practice.
To address similar concerns over security, PrinterLogic uses secure pull printing. What is pull printing? Think of it as two-step verification for your enterprise print environment. There’s the initial step that comes when a user sends a job to a printer you’ve authorized for their use through Active Directory or an IP range. Then there’s the second step that issues the command for the printer to actually print the document.
The “pull” command can be issued in a variety of ways:
Release Station: A PC or tablet (Android or iOS) is set up next to the printer. The device is set to kiosk mode and allows the end user to see and release their print jobs via the PrinterLogic web-based app.
Mobile Device: Any device with a browser can select and release the stored print jobs via PrinterLogic.
Control Panel or Console: The print job is released through a PrinterLogic app that is located on the Multi Function Printer control panel.
What’s different about the way PrinterLogic implements its pull printing solution is that no server is required. Traditional print solutions end up routing the job to be pulled through one or more print servers—which creates additional waypoints where the job can be intercepted, lost or held up.
PrinterLogic, by contrast, uses server-less pull printing, so the job goes directly from the device to the virtual pull printing queue. Once it’s in that queue, it can only be “pulled” by authorized users.
But here’s the ultra-convenient part: Those users can pull the job wherever they happen to be. That means you can print out a sensitive presentation from a workstation on the third floor and pull it for printing once you reach your meeting on the fifth floor. That way, it’s not left sitting in the paper tray for all to see.
PrinterLogic’s server-less, secure pull printing solution is a great way to keep your documents confidential while actually adding practical features. Because, as we all know, even the most rock-solid security features are ineffective if they’re not convenient enough for everyone to use.