Case Studies > Arctic Wolf Helps Gifford Health Maintain a More Proactive Approach to Cybersecurity

Arctic Wolf Helps Gifford Health Maintain a More Proactive Approach to Cybersecurity

Customer Company Size

Mid-size Company

Region

America

Country

United States

Product

Arctic Wolf Managed Detection and Response
Mimecast Email Security Platform

Tech Stack

Managed Detection and Response
Email Security

Implementation Scale

Enterprise-wide Deployment

Impact Metrics

Customer Satisfaction
Digital Expertise
Productivity Improvements

Technology Category

Cybersecurity & Privacy - Endpoint Security
Cybersecurity & Privacy - Network Security
Cybersecurity & Privacy - Security Compliance

Applicable Industries

Healthcare & Hospitals

Applicable Functions

Business Operation
Facility Management

Use Cases

Intrusion Detection Systems

Services

Cybersecurity Services
System Integration

About The Customer

Gifford Health Care is a network of health centers throughout central Vermont and the Upper Valley. Founded well over a century ago, Gifford is a federally qualified nonprofit, community healthcare provider with family health centers and specialty clinics. Named a Top 100 Critical Access Hospital, Gifford has a full-service hospital with a 24-hour emergency department, inpatient and rehabilitation units, a day care, an adult day care, a 30-bed nursing home, and a renowned birthing center.

The Challenge

Beyond saving lives and improving patient quality of life, the healthcare industry faces another daunting task—safeguarding patient data, business operations, and revenue from today’s cybercriminals. As cyberattacks in healthcare become more sophisticated, hospitals will face increased exposure to malpractice claims and potential lawsuits, according to Moody’s Investor Service. The situation is especially difficult for smaller healthcare providers that lack the financial means to weather a data breach. Many of these providers haven’t invested in the kind of technology that can improve their security posture against the growing legion of threat actors. Gifford Health Care knows this situation well. After learning of a breach at a large nearby university health system—and tens of millions of dollars in fines as a result—Gifford’s security team knew it was time to act before they also found themselves on the receiving end of a devastating cyberattack.

The Solution

Gifford began exploring its options for working with a third-party security operations provider. It wanted to enhance its security posture, get more insight into its network, and find the right solutions to make the healthcare organization as secure as possible. Gifford’s security team looked at a variety of cybersecurity solutions and narrowed the field to Arctic Wolf and two category competitors. While Gifford’s security team found each solution’s capabilities relatively comparable, Arctic Wolf’s security operations solutions stood out for its concierge-level service, the Arctic Wolf team’s openness to questions, and overall proactive approach to fortifying the network. For example, during the evaluation process, Gifford discovered the other solutions limited the number of incidents by type, as well as specified the number of reports it would receive. In contrast, the Arctic Wolf solution didn’t impose those limits. Given the small security team at Gifford, having a potential partner that encouraged conversational engagement provided the team with needed assurance. Lacking the capacity to check everything all the time, the Gifford team wanted a partnership built on consultation and prioritization—and, most of all, trust.

Operational Impact

Gifford’s security team signed on with Arctic Wolf and its Arctic Wolf® Managed Detection and Response solution. Right away, Arctic Wolf brought issues to Gifford’s team that could arise and threaten the healthcare provider’s security. Based on that information, Gifford acted on the recommended changes to reduce its vulnerability.
Having in-depth reporting has also helped Gifford’s team get the hospital’s senior management behind new initiatives to improve the organization’s security posture. While senior leadership can tire of IT staff requesting changes, having the information from the reports made the case more readily apparent and compelling.
To guard against cyberattacks, Gifford has partnered with Mimecast for cloud cybersecurity services for email. And Arctic Wolf Managed Detection and Response is now integrated with Mimecast’s solution.
In one case, Arctic Wolf’s reporting identified an email account that someone was trying to log into from Nigeria. When they investigated, the Gifford team was relieved to learn that the account had already been disabled.

Quantitative Benefit