Manufacturer takes a layered approach to their security

Customer

London Manufacturing Company – 30 Employees.

Objective

A complete overhaul of the existing network architecture along with addressing the security posture for both internal and external services. From endpoint to infrastructure, e-mail, and internet.

Solutions

• Cisco AMP for Endpoints
  • Superior protection from advanced threats and hackers
  • Endpoint visibility into file activity and threats
  • Ability to continuously monitor file behaviour
  • Simple, easy to use management interface
• Cisco Umbrella
  • Decreased incidence of phishing and other malware
  • Bolstered security for on and off-network users
  • Reduced security administration time
  • Reduced security administration time
• Cisco Meraki
  • Unified visibility and control of the entire network on a single dashboard – covering wireless, switching, and security appliances
  • Highly available and secure (PCI / HIPAA compliant)
  • Automated network monitoring and alerts
  • Continuous feature updates delivered from the cloud
• Cisco Cloud Email Security
  • Protect employees against ransomware and other email threats
  • Decrease spam to boost employee and network productivity
  • Reduce workload required for management, maintenance, and upgrade
  • Enhanced email security for on-premise exchange

The Challenges for Small Business

Small businesses are one of the easiest targets for cyber-related criminal activity – there are many reasons for this. Outdated security mechanisms, limited IT budgets, along with a limited or non-existent IT team and lacking the tools and technology to proactively protect users and data to name a few.

They believe that they will never be attacked or do not even realise that they have been. A lot also take a ‘it will never happen to me’ approach.

Cybercrime within the SME continues to rise, with 43% of all attacks aimed at the SME and only 14 % are ready to defend themselves.

Unfortunately, once it does happen, it’s all reactive to the problem, but by then it’s almost always too late to remediate. Additionally, many have standard anti-virus, single point products that detect point-in-time threats and deem this an effective way to protect themselves.

As threats become more intelligent across the attack surface, so must the preventative security and increased visibility on your network. To combat the enhanced threat landscape a layered security approach is required, simply put – the more you can see the more you can prevent and protect.  With the right tools in place, you can stop breaches before they occur as well as recover and remediate more effectively.

We believe that the only way to know how good a solution claims to be, is for you to use it for yourself – we then know what we’re selling is the best for our customers.

We use Cisco solutions because we believe in them and will only use what we consider is the best for us as well as our customers.
 
When we use what we sell, our commitment sends a powerful message to our clients.

SEAN DRAPER – MANAGING DIRECTOR RE-SOLUTION

The Engagement

Following a brief introduction with the customer, it was very clear that the security posture of the existing environment was not fit for purpose. They had recently had a data breach and we also being held to hostage from a cyber attack to the extent where a ransom was being demanded for their data.

Having paid the ransom (which was outside of our control and what we would never advise), the cybercriminals were demanding even more for the release of the data. There was a small silver lining, in that the customer had a full recent back of the data being held hostage so no data was lost as a result of the breach, however, it did highlight a need to significantly change the security posture of the infrastructure.

After a detailed assessment was carried out by the Re-solution engineering team – areas of compromise were identified that were left by the shortcomings from the legacy environment.

Problem areas

• Network
• Internet
• Endpoint
• Email

The outcome for the customer was greater control, enhanced protection, along with increased visibility – all at an affordable monthly cost delivered through a trusted Cisco Premier Partner.

The Outcome

Network

The network consisted of unmanaged Ethernet switches along with a broadband router which was performing the perimeter security.

The network was replaced with Cisco Meraki cloud switches, wireless and security. Providing unified visibility and control from a single management dashboard. Additional benefits include monitoring, alerting and automatic updates.

Internet

Public DNS was being used for internet related lookups with no additional protection.

URL protection and intelligent proxy services for both users in the office and off-network through Cisco Umbrella – coupled with Cisco Talos which has insight into 17billion daily web page requests.

AMP for Endpoints

Endpoint protection was using legacy point-in-time and signature-based detection.

With the deployment of next-generation AV (NGAV), all endpoints could now be managed from a single dashboard, with the continuous monitoring of file behaviour. Additional benefits include blocking threats in real-time and behavioural learning.

Email

The customer’s email server was an on-premise exchange environment hosting multiple domains with no additional email security protection.

E-Mail protection was integrated with the on-premise Microsoft exchange server to Cisco Cloud E-Mail Security. Benefits include reducing SPAM e-mail, thus increasing staff productivity along with protecting against enhanced ransomware and other email-related threats.