Nobody in a household is going to read a patch report.
In an office there is somebody whose job includes noticing that eleven laptops are two operating system versions behind. In a household there is nobody, and the machines are more scattered: a personal laptop, a work laptop, an iPad that lives in a bag, a spare in the guest room, two more belonging to people who are not employees in any formal sense but hold your calendar anyway.
Management is the layer that makes the rest possible. It answers what exists, what state it is in, and whether a setting somebody changed in a hurry two years ago is still changed. Everything else we sell assumes this layer is honest. Detection cannot protect an agent that was never installed, and a backup does not cover a laptop nobody wrote down.
What enrolment actually gives you.
Apple devices are managed through Apple\'s own framework: the device is enrolled, it trusts a management authority, and it accepts configuration profiles from that authority over Apple\'s push service. Nothing is bolted on, and nothing needs to defeat the platform to work.
The authority we operate is Addigy, a platform built for Apple and for nothing else. That specialism is the whole reason we chose it: generalist tools treat macOS as Windows with prettier icons, and an Apple household notices inside a fortnight.
What sits inside those profiles is the interesting part:
- A baseline that stays put. Disk encryption switched on and its recovery key escrowed, the firewall enabled, screen lock and passcode policy set, automatic login refused. If somebody turns one off, the device is told to turn it back on.
- Software, deployed rather than downloaded. Applications and updates are pushed from the management platform, which is materially safer than a search engine result on a Sunday evening.
- Inventory that is true today. Serial numbers, models, operating system versions, disk encryption state, installed applications, and last check in time. This is what you hand an insurer or an auditor, and what tells us a device has quietly left the estate.
- Remote remediation. Scripts and commands run against a device without anybody flying anywhere, and without a support session where somebody watches your screen.
- Lost or handed on. A device that has gone missing can be locked. A device leaving the household can be wiped and unenrolled cleanly, which matters when the person leaving is not being replaced.
The same visibility for everything else.
Device Care is N-able N-sight, the monitoring platform placed onto Windows, macOS and Linux computers, and it will also enrol tablets and handsets you would rather hold under one account. Where Addigy goes deep on Apple, N-sight goes wide: it is how a mixed estate stops being a collection of anecdotes.
It reports condition, an inventory of hardware and installed software, and how far behind the patching is. Missing operating system and application patches are the single most reliable way in that does not require any cleverness at all, and patch status is the number our desk works through every month. Machines that stop checking in are chased, because a machine that has gone quiet is either retired or a problem, and only one of those is fine.
The layer that decides where a browser may go.
Web Filtering is the web protection module of that same N-sight platform. It installs alongside Device Care and governs outbound browsing on the machines that carry it. Sites are evaluated by category and reputation before the page loads, which catches the newly registered domain in a text message long before any list of known-bad addresses has heard of it.
It also reports what nobody enjoys discussing: bandwidth consumption, and browsing conducted in a private window. We are explicit about that because it has consequences for who you put it on. It belongs on the machines that handle the business, the money and the correspondence. Whether it belongs on a personal laptop is a household decision and we will implement whichever answer you give.
What management is not.
Enrolment does not let us read your documents, your photographs or your messages, and no part of this service exists to observe a person. We see the state of a machine: its version numbers, its encryption status, its inventory of applications, whether the last backup ran. Web Filtering sees requested addresses on the devices you choose to place it on.
We would rather tell you the boundary than let you assume a smaller one. If a device should be outside the estate entirely, say so and it stays outside. A household where somebody quietly stops using the managed laptop is worse off than one where the line was drawn honestly on day one.
| Built on | Addigy, the Apple device management platform |
|---|---|
| Platforms | macOS and iOS, enrolled through Apple\'s management framework |
| Configuration | Profiles for encryption, firewall, passcode, screen lock and update policy |
| Software | Deployment and update of applications from the management platform |
| Compliance | Continuous checks against the baseline, with automated correction |
| Inventory | Serial, model, operating system, encryption state, applications, last contact |
| Remote action | Scripted remediation, lock, and clean unenrolment or wipe |
| Billed | Monthly, for each Apple device |
| Built on | The N-sight platform from N-able, for monitoring and management |
|---|---|
| Platforms | Windows, macOS and Linux computers |
| Handsets | Enrolment of tablets and handsets you hold under one account |
| Condition | Disk, memory, services, and the last time the agent reported |
| Inventory | What hardware exists and what is installed on it, machine by machine |
| Patching | How far behind each machine is, tracked and worked through monthly |
| Silence | Machines that stop reporting are chased by the desk rather than left |
| Billed | Monthly, for each computer or tablet |
| Built on | Web protection inside that same N-sight platform |
|---|---|
| Requires | Device Care on the same machine |
| Filtering | By site category and by reputation, evaluated before the page loads |
| Coverage | Browser and programmatic requests, including private browsing windows |
| Reporting | Sites visited, categories, reputation and bandwidth consumed |
| Placement | Applied per device, at your instruction, not automatically across the estate |
| Billed | Monthly, for each device carrying it |
Where this family stops
Management keeps a device in a known state. It does not watch for an attacker on the machine, which is Detection and response, and it does not decide which programs are permitted to execute, which is Application allowlisting.
Phones can be enrolled under Device Care for management purposes. Actively protecting a phone against malicious applications, hostile networks and phishing is a different service and is described in Phones and tablets.