Charnwood Borough Council
Like many organisations, CBC was using a number of different security technologies to protect itself against the burgeoning myriad of online threats. For example, it outsourced its firewall, VPN, email filtering and web filtering security to separate companies. However, CBC discovered that not only is this method cost-ineffective, it also brings with it an administrative burden that significantly impacts resources. CBC turned to Network Box because it provides unified threat management (UTM) via a managed service, meaning it secures private networks, protects against all online threats and, crucially, requires negligible administration.
Since implementing Network Box, CBC has unparalleled visibility and can see everything that is happening on the organisation's network.
"We've been able to detect a number of emails that contained inappropriate content that we don't want distributed via our network. For example, one employee sent an email containing lots of wedding pictures which would have been downloaded on to her PC. This type of email is then sent to friends. The images weren't explicit or inappropriate, but circulating that many images absorbs lots of the network's bandwidth, which then slows the system for other users. Network Box allows us to block these emails and educate users on what the email system should be used for," says Turner.
Network Box has also helped CBC reduce its bandwidth use. Turner explains: "Audio and video downloads used to be a problem because of the drain on bandwidth; now Network Box allows us to simply prevent or restrict the downloading or streaming of large files, unless there is a real business case supporting the requirement."
"Overall, we've been thoroughly impressed with Network Box and would recommend it to any organisation that is wasting lots of money and time running lots of different security solutions."
