Lumen

Lifecycle management – notification of end of sale/end of support. The same service guide lists CPE break/fix (RMA) warranty support for failed devices and processing of return material authorisation replacement requests, plus patch management for all hardware and software. The SD-WAN service schedule states that during the initial service term purchased CPE is eligible for the Managed Device Replacement Service Level in the Lumen Service Level Agreement, so replacement is contractual rather than best effort.

Native, confirmed directly - 'Route traffic over the most efficient connection for high performance' [3]

Native, confirmed directly - 'Route traffic over the most efficient connection for high performance, and update routing and security rules in real time as network needs change' [3]

Native, confirmed directly and with genuine specificity - 'the ability to intelligently use lower cost Internet connections to achieve MPLS-like QoS' [2]

Native, confirmed directly by name as a supported WAN underlay ('4G/LTE') [5]

Native, confirmed directly via the confirmed 'physical and virtual customer-premises equipment (CPE)' architecture description [2]

The Sovereign SASE solution is deployed on dedicated SASE gateways in Lumen's global points of presence (PoPs) or on customer premises, based on the customer's preference and needs. The PoPs are Lumen's own, which is what this field measures, and the SASE product page advertises 50+ low-latency edge nodes in key metro areas. The security software running in them is Versa or Fortinet technology, which does not change the ownership of the infrastructure. One complication is recorded in conflicts: the SASE service guide also describes an option delivered through a global network of VMware SASE points of presence, which would be partner_integrated rather than Lumen-owned.

The Lumen SD-WAN with Versa Networks network Controllers are hosted within Lumen facilities, but can also be deployed as private infrastructure in a customer provided environment for an additional charge. Reinforced by the dated May 2024 Versa Sovereign SASE press release, which states the solution is deployed on dedicated SASE gateways in Lumen's global PoPs or on customer premises based on the customer's preference and needs. Customer-hosted, dedicated and sovereign options are therefore documented, not only shared multi-tenant locations.

Black Lotus Labs, Lumen's threat research team, leverages its unique visibility into Lumen's global internet backbone using ML algorithms to generate threat intelligence Lumen owns and operates its own global backbone, which is the substance of this field. Confidence is medium rather than high for two reasons: the clearest wording found is incidental to a threat intelligence sentence, and the most explicit owned-fibre statement found, that Lumen operates the largest ultra-low-loss intercity fiber network in North America, is scoped to North America. No page reviewed states as a product property that inter-region SASE or SD-WAN traffic rides the Lumen backbone rather than the public internet.

Native, confirmed directly and with genuine specificity - a named, sized CPE device tier ('Extra Small CPE Device') is confirmed directly as part of Lumen's disclosed pricing structure [4]

Native, confirmed directly and with genuine specificity - the confirmed service wrapper includes 'appliance/circuit monitoring' and '24/7 support for the entire WAN solution' [5]

Lumen offers Service Availability Service Levels for Qualifying Services based on the following Availability Tiers. The published Lumen Service Level Agreement names Lumen SD-WAN Service with Versa Networks, Lumen SD-WAN Service with Cisco Meraki and Lumen SASE Solutions as qualifying services, and carries availability tiers, a four hour incident response commitment, managed device replacement targets, and regional latency, jitter and packet delivery objectives. These are credit-bearing contractual commitments rather than best-effort targets.

Next Generation Firewall (NGFW) is available as a service license with Fortinet and is powered by FortiOS The firewall function is Fortinet technology licensed and operated by Lumen, so partner_integrated rather than yes. The same guide describes anti-malware, web filtering and firewall, intrusion detection and prevention (IDS/IPS) within the unified threat management set, and the SD-WAN service schedule describes a Security Upgrade providing a set of firewall, web filtering and intrusion prevention. The function is integrated into the delivered platform, but the technology belongs to another vendor.

Native, confirmed with genuine specificity via a named product - Versa Secure Private Access (VSPA) 'secure remote workforces at the edge with user-centric' access [4]

Native, confirmed with genuine specificity via a named product - Versa Secure Private Access (VSPA) 'secure remote workforces at the edge with user-centric' access [4]

Native, confirmed directly as part of the SSE capability list - 'Secure Web Gateway (SWG)' named explicitly [6]

Native, confirmed directly by name - 'Cloud Access Security Broker (CASB)' named explicitly as SSE-compatible [6] Specific inline-versus-API-mode technical detail not itemised

intrusion detection and prevention (IDS/IPS), and data loss prevention DLP is listed on the Lumen SASE product page as one of the Security Service Edge services alongside NGFW, SWG, ZTNA and CASB, and appears in the SASE service guide within the Fortinet-powered feature set, so it is another vendor's engine operated by Lumen. No Lumen page reviewed describes content classification detail, blocking versus flagging behaviour, alerting or exception workflows, so confidence is medium on the depth of the capability rather than on its presence.

Lumen resources are available 24x7 for support. Graded partial for two reasons. First, the SD-WAN and Managed Equipment service guide evidences 24x7x365 performance management by Lumen skilled operations engineers and continuous network monitoring, which covers the NOC half, but the SASE service guide states that the Pro-Managed service does not include security operations center services, so the SOC half is not part of the standard managed wrap. Second, no source reviewed documents ownership of incidents through to root cause analysis, structured service reviews or change governance as contractual elements; those terms were searched for in both service guides and the service schedule and not found.