New managed Web security system for a London borough

We wrote a couple of days ago about the emergence of a trend toward Web Security-as-a-Service (SaaS) business model which more and more organizations adopt. Here is as case study of SaaS in the field, as implemented by one of the companies we mentioned in our analysis, San Mateo, California-based ScanSafe. The company is currently providing a safe Web environment for about 3,000 local government workers at the London Borough of Barnet. The council is using ScanSafes managed Web Filtering and Web Malware Screening services to protect its network from malware threats and to control use of the Internet by its employees. Rick Sweeney, infrastructure manager at the London Borough of Barnet commented: “Our confidence on Web security issues is now much higher. We feel that we have minimal exposure to threats because we are using a solution that has the features, capacity and flexibility to meet our current and future needs.”

As has been the case with many other organizations, Barnet has become more dependent on the Internet and Web-based applications in recent years, whether it is used for providing IT support to its satellite offices, sharing information with local police and health authorities, or allowingBarnet residents to check up on local planning applications.

Before deploying ScanSafe, Barnet used a URL filtering software solution in several of its libraries. When it came to selecting a borough-wide solution, however, Barnet opted for a managed service because it removed the need for onsite deployment of software or hardware and required no maintenance, thus freeing internal IT staff to focus on other tasks. Additionally, ScanSafe offered real-time scanning of Web traffic powered by Outbreak Intelligence, a proprietary security platform that detects zero-hour and known malware threats. Outbreak Intelligence uses a combination of multiple, correlated detection technologies, automated machine-learning heuristics, and a large Web data set to offer a solution against Web malware, removing it before it reaches the corporate network. ScanSafe says its system now blocks an average of 175,000 instances of malware and 60,000 unwanted URLs for Barnet each month, acting as the council’s first line of defence against Web threats.