Project Summary
Newham College has dramatically improved their security posture via the deployment of next generation firewalls and the installation of a comprehensive email protection solution with the guidance and support of NG-IT. Total email protection is a modular cloud-based solution driven by an artificial intelligence engine that can identify complex email threats such as targeted phishing attacks with social engineering elements that often by-pass traditional email security.
Setting the Scene
Newham College is situated in the London Borough of Newham. The college’s main site is in East Ham, with a further site in Stratford, and six further local neighbourhood learning centres including the Fashion and Textile Museum, located in London Bridge.
Like many education establishments, the college is reliant on IT infrastructure for the delivery of critical services to faculty and students. Comprehensive protection of this infrastructure from cyber threats is obviously vital the colleges ability to function securely and confidently.
The UK education sector has recently seen a dramatic increase in email borne cyber attacks that are used as a point of entry for cyber criminals to gain control over key computer systems and networks or to exploit staff by the use of social engineering techniques in the pursuit of financial gain.
The Challenge
The College had previously subscribed to a fully managed service that included cyber security when they became the victim of a significant email phishing attack leaving them in an extremely difficult position in terms of performance and confidence of in-place security measures with genuine concerns that unless dramatic improvements were made, funding would be withdrawn, and the college would be forced to close.
The challenge was to remove these issues, rapidly improve protection at the college to defend against further cyber-attacks and achieve Cyber Essentials accreditation as quickly as possible.
The Benefits
- Elevated security posture leading to reduced security concerns.
- Improved effectiveness of both hardware and software solution.
- Simplified administration of deployed cyber security.
- 500 cyber-attacks successfully blocked since installation.
- Cyber Essentials accreditation gained.
- Project concluded on budget and ahead of target – the college were hoping to complete within a five month window and were delighted with completion in only 3 months.
Customer Testimonial
Darren Evans, Head of IT described the service provided by NG-IT as “exceptional. I was new to the College and NG-IT held our hand through out, giving us confidence that we could get resolve our problems with the right products. I did not feel pushed into purchasing a particular technology, the solution we decided upon was a perfect fit for us and a lot of thought and consideration was given to our unique needs throughout the buying process. I have worked in IT for 20 years, and never retained a supplier when moving organisations but I will certainly be taking NG-IT forward with me- This is a credit to the team in terms of the service and working partnership that they delivered.”
