The Volunteer Center of Sonoma County, a nonprofit resource and referral center, heavily relies on the internet and a network of 40 PCs to run its daily operations and fulfill its mission. The center is responsible for a wide range of activities, from fundraising to providing services to over 17,000 people annually. The center's operations also involve the use of PCs by seniors, children, and teenagers. The center wanted to control web surfing and protect its users from inappropriate content. However, while safeguarding information and protecting users was imperative, the center lacked the knowledge and resources to manage security. The center was in need of an affordable, hands-off security management solution that did not require a security or IT expert on staff.

Beijing MTR Corporation, a joint venture between Beijing Infrastructure Co. Ltd, Beijing Capital Group, and MTR Corporation, operates the Beijing Metro Line 4. As a pivotal part of Beijing's transportation infrastructure, it was crucial for the company to uphold their security protection. The company faced several challenges including protecting business critical applications, securing remote access to internal assets for authorized users, managing 24 subway stations along with independent data and disaster recovery centers, and improving security across the organization. They needed to ensure uptime for services including exchange mail, client management servers, production and business services, and voice and video services. Additionally, they needed to safeguard their Internet, Intranet, and Application Data, protect network planning and OA office systems, and find a manageable solution covering all perimeter operations.

The Faculty of Engineering of the University of Porto (FEUP) was facing a significant challenge in increasing its internet access bandwidth, which was rated at 1Gbps, while maintaining or even enhancing security. The engineering school required a solution that could support quick, secure data transfer, a crucial requirement for researchers involved in international projects. The existing problem was that high security levels led to a drastic reduction in speed. Therefore, a solution was needed that could satisfy the users' need for speed while maintaining an adequate level of protection. The solution had to accelerate data packet transfer and simultaneously handle cyber attacks and other security issues. This required an increase in packet analysis and processing capacity to maintain the necessary performance and security levels. The most significant challenge was finding a solution that could control new dynamic protocols as they emerged on the market, ensuring business continuity without interruption, and maintaining security while being transparent to users.

Quang Trung Software City (QTSC), a government-run software development park in Vietnam, was facing a significant challenge in provisioning security services for its rapidly growing population. The park, which is the largest IT park in Vietnam with over 3,000 occupants, was struggling to manage the ever-increasing security threats with a small IT staff. The existing security solution was not scalable enough to deliver services to the many companies comprising the software technology park. QTSC needed to ensure that their users have secure access to corporate resources. The challenge was to upgrade to a scalable, sophisticated security solution that could handle the increasing security threats without adding administrative burden.

Bentley Systems, a global leader in the development of engineering, design, and CAD software, faced a significant challenge in maintaining global inter-office connectivity and internet access without compromising security. The company, which has invested over $1 billion in research, development, and acquisitions since 1995, needed to protect its global corporate network without impacting its day-to-day software development business. This was particularly challenging given the wide range of old and new machines and operating systems used by Bentley Systems' developers to replicate customer environments. The company needed to block malicious malware and worms from traversing the network, deploy security in remote areas of the world, provide broad coverage in protecting application vulnerabilities, and quickly implement security for the IT infrastructure of acquired companies.

Yankuang Group, a large conglomerate based in Zhucheng, China, faced a significant challenge in managing IT and security for its 50 subsidiary companies. The company needed to improve secure access for its branch offices and tele-workers, which included as many as 80 branch networks and 20,000 computer users. The complexity of the IT environment was further amplified by the high number of different applications running on multiple systems, such as ERP, medical insurance, office automation, email, corporate website, and production automation. Traditional antivirus software and servers access control lists were inadequate to protect its infrastructure. The company also needed a manageable and flexible system that could scale up as its IT infrastructure expands.

AAA New York, a provider of automotive, travel, and financial services to nearly 1.6 million members, faced several challenges in maintaining network security and data integrity. With a diverse network that includes multiple branch locations, call centers, and an ecommerce site, AAA New York required robust security features and management capabilities. The company needed to protect its network from next-generation and Web 2.0 threats, adhere to strict industry, state, and federal compliance guidelines, reduce management complexity, and improve visibility of traffic across multiple network segments. The company also aimed to uphold customer confidence, maintain regulatory compliance, reduce network security management complexity, maintain network integrity, and improve employee productivity.

The American low-cost airline, operating scheduled and charter flights across 120 locations, faced a significant challenge in securing its virtual desktop infrastructure environment. The airline had previously supplied laptops for staff and deployed physical firewalls at each location. However, because traffic was shared over a common network, any security or network problem at one airport could potentially affect all locations. The infrastructure was not only costly but also difficult to manage consistently. As the threat landscape intensified, the airline’s team wanted to simplify their network design, bring more automation into their releases, and increase their ability to prevent attacks across an increasingly virtualized infrastructure. The airline chose to deploy VMware NSX in their datacenter and implement a virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) delivered over Internet links to all airports. This move aimed to simplify network management, deliver greater agility, and enable the team to micro-segment traffic with policies specific to each segment for higher resiliency.

State Transport Leasing Company (STLC), a leading Russian leasing company specializing in transport, was facing several challenges related to its cyber security. The company needed to consolidate multiple security solutions to simplify management and improve security. The corporate network was under constant threat from both external and internal sources, and there was a need to protect against advanced and zero-day threats. The company also wanted to enhance endpoint security without interrupting the business flow. The challenge was to increase security effectiveness and ease the workload of the security admin. In recent years, the company had faced issues related to data protection, including unauthorized access to corporate resources and threats posed by ransomware. While the IT team was able to prevent these issues as they arose, the management realized the need for proactive threat prevention to avoid potential damage to the business.

Optimal media GmbH, a leading media services provider in Europe, faced significant challenges in protecting its intellectual property and preventing the loss of sensitive customer data. The company's IT department was responsible for network and IT security systems for all eight of Edel AG’s European offices. The data they received from customers for the production of CDs or records contained highly sensitive information and intellectual property that required robust protection. The International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) audited the IT security systems at optimal media each year, and the company had always passed. However, the threat level was becoming increasingly critical, and the time required to prepare for the audits was becoming unmanageable. Their existing, outdated firewall solution was insufficient for long-term use as it could not handle unknown threats.

The U.S. Public Health Services Provider, a leading West Coast provider of emergency health services, was faced with the challenge of securing its patients’ highly sensitive data. With over two million patients and more than 90 locations, the organization was a prime target for malicious actors. The potential breach of information such as patients’ medical information, social security numbers, and personal addresses could lead to disastrous results including identity theft, insurance fraud, and data manipulation leading to mistreatment. Additionally, the organization had critical medical devices that required internet connectivity. Any compromise in connectivity due to an attack could result in serious repercussions to patients receiving emergency care, including delays in treatments, worsening of conditions, or even death. The organization needed a solution that would not just detect advanced threats to its network, but ultimately prevent them from coming in.

Laurenty, a family group specializing in cleaning, road sweeping, building, and green spaces, faced a significant challenge in unifying its security standards across networks and endpoints. The company needed to comply with the European General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) laws, which were set to come into force in 2018. In 2015, Laurenty realized that its IT security infrastructure was technically outdated and fragmented. The company was using several point products to address specific security challenges, which resulted in multiple consoles, different approaches, and no global visibility. Furthermore, the impending GDPR regulations required all European companies to demonstrate that all personal data held by them is protected, particularly against theft. Non-compliance could result in severe penalties of up to 4% of the company's annual turnover. To protect its laptops against data breaches, Laurenty needed a strong encryption solution.

OpenLink, a global leader in asset management solutions for the energy, corporate and financial industries, faced several challenges. The company needed to secure public cloud environments for each of its clients, increase client servicing capacity while minimizing physical infrastructure and management requirements, and reduce infrastructure costs while increasing competitive advantage. OpenLink's solutions were typically deployed in clients’ own data centers, built with high amounts of excess processing capacity to handle peak periods of demand. This resulted in high capital investment, maintenance, and support costs. For smaller clients without large data centers, OpenLink began hosting customer workloads and data in its own data center, functioning as a service or hosting provider, processing large amounts of client data. This situation led OpenLink to consider a service delivery architecture that included public cloud to support more clients with less physical infrastructure and with the added flexibility to scale on demand for peak usage periods.

Edenred, a global leader in prepaid corporate services, faced several challenges in maintaining the security of its operations. The company needed to stop malicious files attached to emails from entering their network or users’ inboxes. They also had to manage consistent, end-to-end security across four continents, ensuring compliance with multiple security regulations. As a financial organization, Edenred was subject to the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS), banking regulations, transaction authorization requirements, and General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) laws. The company needed to create security and compliance standards that encompass its operations in North America, Europe, Brazil, and Singapore. The challenge was to find a solution that provides not only the best protection but also can meet the most demanding compliance standards.

The global asset management company, with nearly $620 billion under management, was facing a challenge in securely segmenting and protecting applications, whether on-premises or in the cloud. They were also struggling with the management of private cloud security and gaining visibility into traffic inside the data center or lateral threat prevention for internal traffic. The firm’s security infrastructure team was already managing firewalls and rules, proxies, and remote access using Check Point solutions. However, as they deployed a VMware NSX private cloud environment, they needed to secure it while maintaining security for their existing data center applications.

The case study revolves around one of the largest credit unions in the United States, which was facing significant challenges in securing highly sensitive data, such as customers’ private and credit card information. The credit union was under constant threat from malware and phishing attacks, and needed to protect against a wide range of zero-day threats. The bank’s Information Security team, consisting of only four people, was spending up to 20 hours a week remediating problems. The previous solution, a firewall and email security gateway using signature-based detection, had been letting various Zero-Day malware through its perimeter. Users would receive emails with infected attachments or links that once clicked would cost the bank a lot of overhead. The company knew it had to find a solution that significantly reduced the time spent on remediation of email-borne infections, and made management of security simpler and more effective. It sought a security solution that would stay one step ahead of the curve and be able to defend against advanced threats such as ZeroDay and ransomware attacks.

Denham Capital, a private equity firm with over $8.5 billion invested in power, oil and gas, and mining industries, faced a significant challenge in ensuring the security of their cloud-based assets. The firm was in the process of migrating its infrastructure to the cloud and needed a solution that would provide the same level of security for their cloud-based assets as their premises-based assets. The unpredictable nature of the energy industry demanded a high level of adaptability and agility. Denham Capital needed a solution that would reduce the high costs of operating physical data centers, increase application performance, and enable rapid and easy deployment and provisioning of new offices or users without compromising performance or security. The firm's lean IT team needed to protect data and applications in the cloud, gain visibility into traffic both on premises and in the cloud, and ensure consistent security everywhere.

Tecnun, the School of Engineering in San Sebastián, part of the University of Navarre, was facing a significant challenge in securing its digital campus. The transition to a digital university, the rise of social networks, increased voice and video traffic, and the migration of applications and services to the cloud were pushing the network infrastructure to its limits. The university was being targeted by numerous attacks of all kinds, and the existing solutions from different vendors only provided partial coverage. The security management had become highly complex, with a requirement to simultaneously manage and monitor various sites. The university lacked the capacity to correlate or analyze all the information generated by the various protection systems in place.

The Conseil Départemental du Val de Marne, a public sector organization managing the economic and social activity of 1.4 million inhabitants, was facing a significant challenge. Their computers, including those in the IT Department, were experiencing regular cyber attacks. These attacks were primarily caused by suspicious email attachments containing either known or new malicious code. Despite having antivirus programs installed, the malware was so sophisticated that it could evade detection. The IT team was tasked with finding a solution to this growing problem to ensure a secure working environment. The organization needed to protect itself against advanced threats and block all malware in real time, and manage the entire environment from a single console.

Fondazione Telethon, a medical nonprofit organization based in Italy, was facing significant security challenges. The organization, which fosters research for rare genetic diseases, handles a large amount of sensitive, high-quality research and medical data. The security of this data was critical, not only for information safety and business continuity but also for maintaining the organization's stellar reputation. Any security breach could potentially cause irreparable damage to its future fundraising campaigns and limit its ability to support research. The escalating cyber threats were exposing Telethon to significant risk. The organization needed a threat protection solution that could secure its network at the edge and provide email protection, as email is a primary attack vector. Telethon also sought better insight into cyber threats to analyze attacks, infections, and impact, and wanted to improve visibility and incident analysis capabilities.

Ultima Business Solutions, a UK-based IT services provider, faced a significant challenge in protecting its employee laptops from zero-day malware and suspicious sites and applications when used outside the company's security perimeter. The company had a 'cloud-first' secure cloud migration program, but lacked comprehensive visibility into threats on laptops used outside the perimeter. The challenge was further compounded when employees were in the field, as the security team had no visibility into these devices. Moreover, users were often unaware if their devices were under attack, as there were few obvious symptoms.

The Australian non-profit community service organization, with over 3,500 staff members, was faced with the challenge of securely moving their mission-critical applications and sensitive CRM data to the cloud. They chose Microsoft Azure for its cloud computing infrastructure but needed a robust security solution that offered intelligence, simplicity, and manageability. The traditional approach of the Microsoft cloud using built-in controls of port groups and static firewall rules was not sustainable for the small IT team. The organization also required a solution that could scale with cost-effectiveness. The challenge was to find a security solution that could be integrated with Azure, as many firewall vendors either didn’t have offerings for Azure, couldn’t provide supporting information about integration, or lacked experience in the security industry.

Daymark Solutions, a company that designs and implements data center infrastructure, data protection, cloud services and managed services, was faced with the challenge of preventing cyberthreats, malware and ransomware from penetrating their hybrid cloud environment. They needed a powerful next-generation firewall with advanced threat prevention capabilities and deeper visibility into threats and firewall activity inside the cloud. As their customers began migrating workloads to the cloud, Daymark needed to ensure the security of these applications and workloads. They chose Microsoft Azure as their cloud delivery platform and began moving core assets into it. However, they needed to protect their intellectual property and their customers' cloud data. They also needed better visibility into the Azure environment for troubleshooting, forensics and reporting purposes.

Koch Media, a leading independent producer and marketer of digital entertainment products, faced significant challenges in securing its applications and intellectual property, including game code, across its 25 locations. Each location had its own security rules and policies, making the task even more complex. The company was using Cisco Adaptive Security Appliances (ASA) in each location, which required manual reconfiguration for any firewall rule change. This process was not only time-consuming but also prone to human error. Moreover, the company was dealing with a growing amount of malware that its antivirus was unable to detect. Another major concern was the safe sharing of large files, as securing ports or IP addresses was no longer sufficient. The company needed a solution that could secure the application layer, especially for assets like game code.

The health insurance company, a large U.S. carrier, was facing a growing number of cyber-attacks, putting patient care data and financial data at risk. The company had multiple point solutions, each with its own set of capabilities, and wanted to add layers of security and new features to close some gaps, such as improving Data Loss Prevention (DLP) coverage. The company had multiple, separate firewalls for web filtering, content filtering, and Intrusion Prevention System (IPS) protection. As the CISO and his team evaluated their options, they looked at Palo Alto Networks, F5, FireEye, and several niche solutions. However, none of them offered the unique combination of comprehensive features, high scalability, centralized threat visibility, and low IT overhead that they wanted.

The award-winning hospital, one of the premier healthcare providers in the Northeastern U.S., faced a significant challenge in maintaining the security of its critical healthcare operations and data. The hospital had to meet stringent government healthcare regulatory requirements, including the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA). The hospital's network, which supports its most important patient services and business operations, was used by approximately 1,200 users. The IT team was aware of the evolving security landscape, with zero-day malware emerging as a major threat. The stakes were high, as even a brief security lapse could compromise business systems or impact healthcare services. The team also recognized the need to protect the network from threats originating inside the hospital.

SE2, a third-party administration services provider to major insurance carriers globally, faced a significant challenge in protecting its clients' highly sensitive financial data from being leaked, exfiltrated, or held for ransom. The company was also tasked with proactively preventing unknown malware and zero-day threats. The task of keeping up with new threats was a constant challenge, consuming a significant portion of the security team’s time. They monitored logs, reviewed events, and simultaneously tried to advance new security projects. However, their efforts seemed insufficient. The existing sandboxing solution took up to 10 minutes to alert the team after malware hit a workstation, which was too late to stop, resulting in additional effort to remediate any impact.

Community Newspaper Group (CNG), a provider of local news throughout Western Australia, was facing challenges in securing their digital assets and end-user systems. With over 700,000 readers relying on their daily content, any downtime affecting the network or employees could lead to lost revenue and dissatisfied clients. The existing security solutions from Trend Micro and Microsoft were aging and lacked the visibility into threats that the IT team needed. The team had to navigate multiple dashboards to gather data from various areas of the network and piece together a picture of what was happening. The challenge was to find a solution that could provide better visibility and actionable data for fighting advanced threats on laptops and desktops, minimize security impact on users, and simplify and centralize threat monitoring, management, and reporting.

Terma, a global defense and aerospace contractor based in Denmark, faced a significant challenge in securing mobile connections to internal corporate information. The company's employees routinely work with highly confidential information, and the company must meet specific security requirements before collaborating on projects. As mobile devices became essential to employees, Terma needed to ensure that these devices and remote connections to corporate assets were as secure as desktop systems and connections. The company had implemented multiple layers of security, such as firewalls, filters, encryption, and others, to protect devices and information in all its product areas. However, when it came to securing mobile access to data for its 600 mobile users, Terma needed a robust solution.

Optix, a leading provider of practice management software for optical professionals in the U.K., faced the challenge of ensuring stronger protection for client business data and secure VPN connections for each client. The company needed to simplify the management of hundreds of connected appliances. As healthcare providers, opticians treat patients and have the same requirements for managing patient, scheduling, and clinical data as other healthcare providers. Ensuring patient privacy and meeting other compliance regulations are critical. More than 800 opticians in the U.K. turn to Optix solutions to gain high-quality practice management tools without the worries of having to deploy, manage, upgrade, or support IT equipment and applications themselves. However, the Secure Socket Layer (SSL) protocol that Optix used to protect connections was no longer sufficient to secure patient, clinical, confidential business, and payment information.