Case Study #4617
The Township of Lyndhurst, New Jersey, lies just ten miles outside of Manhattan, yet retains its small-town sense of community. While the Township enjoys a strong network of service businesses and a growing technology and Web development sector, its own governmental networking infrastructure had not kept up-to-date. So, when Mayor Richard DiLascio was elected into office, he made a commitment to better serve the community's needs by revitalizing the Township's network technology and remediating the Township's network security shortcomings. To take on this significant endeavor, Mayor DiLascio engaged the IT management services of New Jersey-based MSI Technologies, LLC.
The Challenge:
Revitalize network security, e-mail security, secure remote access, wireless connectivity and disaster recovery.
MSI's first pressing assignment was to begin securely unifying the Township's disparate networks at multiple isolated locations. The Township uses handheld RF devices to gather water meter data in the field, which get docked and downloaded at the Department of Public Works. But then that data had to get transferred to the billing system at Town Hall, which employees had to manually carry the data on disks back and forth between locations.
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Upon further evaluation, MSI found the Township had many additional significant network security needs. Security for passwords, encryption, and malware protection were seriously deficient. The Mayor's office had no direct network access to Town Hall. The Township's POP Mail Service was overloaded with spam. Backup systems were inoperative. MSI required a flexible, comprehensive solution that could also work within the Township's budget limitations. They selected SonicWALL to meet their needs.
The Solution:
SonicWALL Network Security, Secure Remote Access, Secure Distributed Wireless, Email Security, and Backup and Recovery solutions.
"The flexibility of the SonicWALL products in an environment like Lyndhurst allows an administrator to implement separate technologies across the board for a specific solution," said Joshua Simon, a member of the MSI consulting team for the Township of Lyndhurst. "You're able to use higher-level technologies like e-mail security and UTM at a reasonable cost."
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To connect the Department of Public Works with Town Hall, MSI deployed SonicWALL TZ 170 network security appliances to set up a secure, site-to-site IPSec VPN tunnel. Then, as the WAN extended to additional sites and usage expanded, MSI upgraded the gateway firewalls to SonicWALL PRO 2040 network security appliances. Eventually, MSI also added SonicWALL TZ 190 Wireless network security appliances to provide Township employees and the public with secure WiFi access to governmental information and services.
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Next, to provide secure remote access between the Mayor's office and Town Hall, MSI deployed a SonicWALL SSL-VPN 200 appliance. MSI then implemented a SonicWALL Email Security appliance along with Microsoft Exchange, and ensured the Township's continuous data backup and recovery preparedness with a SonicWALL CDP appliance.
The Result:
Comprehensive and affordable high-performance network security.
SonicWALL TZ and PRO Series appliances have enabled MSI to easily create a secure, unified Township network. SonicWALL allows MSI to easily configure a custom solution for every Township network security scenario, using an expanding array of seamlessly integrated services for gateway anti-virus, anti-spam, anti-spyware, intrusion prevention, enforced desktop anti-virus, content filtering and Application Firewall. SonicWALL appliances also intelligently enforce and dynamically update each of these services as new updates become available.
"It's our policy at MSI to always deploy SonicWALL appliances with all their comprehensive UTM services activated," said MSI's Technical Services Partner, Darren Sammartino.
Since deploying the SonicWALL SSL-VPN 200 appliance, the Mayor and other department heads can securely access terminal services from remote offices, or even at home, day or night. And if MSI needs to change group policy, the SSL-VPN 200 allows them to make the change from home or MSI headquarters, without physically visiting a Township site.
SonicWALL Email Security reduced per-mailbox spam rates from 200-per-day to virtually zero. By replacing a tape backup that hadn't functioned effectively for over two years, the SonicWALL CDP appliance provides Lyndhurst with automatic site-to-site backup between locations, as well as encrypted offsite backup to the SonicWALL Data Center. And SonicWALL TZ 190W appliances have enabled MSI to successfully extend secure WiFi access to Lyndhurst court offices, staff training classrooms, and public parks.
The Future:
Moving Lyndhurst forward into the 21st century.
MSI has since leveraged the SonicWALL PRO 2040 performance capability to install Verizon FiOS telephone, Internet and digital video services at Township locations. They have also recently added yet another crucial Township site - The Office of Emergency Management - to the network with a SonicWALL TZ 190W appliance. SonicWALL continues to play a crucial role in MSI's ongoing enhancements to the Township's network.
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"The SonicWALL line allows you to customize what you want to do, where you want to do it, and take a multifaceted approach. You're not tied-in to one master product," said Simon.