Slava Dementyev of HPE presents the latest advancements in integrated security, focusing on Access Assurance, the AI-driven HPE Mist cloud NAC (Network Access Control). He underscores the guiding principle that networking is an essential part of the security framework rather than just "plumbing," as it provides the visibility and enforcement points necessary for a Zero Trust architecture. Since its launch in 2023, Access Assurance has seen 100% year-over-year growth, with over 1,200 organizations, including healthcare, manufacturing, and government agencies, adopting the technology. The core of this growth is attributed to a scalable cloud architecture that handles millions of daily authentications while allowing for rapid feature deployment.

A major focus of the presentation is improving operational confidence through two new "Change Management" features. The first is a Dry Run mode for policy rules, allowing administrators to evaluate a new rule against real-time production traffic without actually enforcing it. The system increments a hit counter to show which clients would be affected, and a Blast Radius analysis on the NAC clients page lets admins compare a client's current production role with its potential dry run role. This proactive validation ensures that introducing new use cases doesn't inadvertently break existing connectivity in large-scale environments.

The second innovation is a Marvis-driven policy analyzer that uses Large Language Models to scan the entire rule set for logical errors. By comparing current configurations with historical authentication data, Marvis can identify shadowed rules, where a generic rule high in the list prevents more specific rules below it from ever being reached, as well as unused or overly broad policies. Dementyev explains that while this currently functions through a conversational prompt, it will evolve into a proactive Marvis Action. Additionally, the platform supports both built-in and external PKI and offers site survivability via Mist Edge to ensure that NAC functions continue locally even during a WAN failure.

Presented by Slava Dementyev, Product Management Director. Recorded live at Mobility Field Day 14 in San Jose, CA on May 6, 2026. Watch the entire presentation at https://techfieldday.com/appearance/hpe-presents-at-mobility-field-day-14/ or visit https://TechFieldDay.com/event/mfd14 or https://www.hpe.com/us/en/networking.html for more information.