The Ohio State University isn't just a campus in Columbus. As a land-grant university, Ohio State has a physical presence throughout the state, with campus research centers throughout the state and extension offices in each of Ohio's 88 counties.
The Challenge
Director of Information Technology for the Division of Arts and Humanities within the College of Arts and Sciences at The Ohio State University, Tim Smith, deployed an Astaro Security Gateway 525 and 220 on the college’s network back in 2006. “With the Astaro appliances we experienced greater productivity, reduced risk and costs savings,” said Smith. While Smith was happy with the Astaro’s performance the college’s rapid growth through mergers and organic growth meant Ohio State University would need a security product that could offer more power than the 525 appliance. “We were adding the Arts department to our network which basically doubled the size of our network,” explained Smith.
The Requirements
Most of the university’s requirements for a security product had not changed since Smith first looked into Astaro. They still needed a fully integrated security solution that would offer virus and spyware protection, consolidate and filter network traffic from multiple buildings and was simple to manage. However, they now needed a faster model that could handle the increase in network traffic the college’s growth would bring.
The Solution
Smith decided to add an Astaro Security Gateway to his network security configuration.
“I was happy with the Astaro product as it was still providing the productivity increase and network protection we needed. So, when it came time to increase our configuration we didn’t look at any other products,” explained Smith. With the new implementation the Division of Arts and Humanities now has three Astaro Security Gateway appliances on campus; a 625 to protect the network, a 320 in an offsite computer lab and a 220 at a remote office location.
Success with Astaro
The Astaro Security Gateway 625 now protects over 2,500 individuals and 19 buildings at Ohio State University and filters approximately 200 gigabytes of traffic each day. Additionally, the Astaro stops approximately 40-50 viruses at the border a day, saving Smith and William Strucke, Systems Manager time from having to diagnose and cure these issues. “The transition between the 525 and 625 appliance was completely seamless. None of our users were aware of the change as it didn’t halt or adversely affect network traffic or connectivity in anyway,” said Strucke.
The 625 appliance has helped reduce the number of helpdesk calls and made Smith feel the network is even more secure than it was before. Smith continued: “The increased power provided by the Astaro 625 and the ability to handle the additional network traffic were exactly what we were looking for. We were happy with Astaro before and we continue to be pleased with its performance. We would definitely choose the Astaro Security Gateway to protect our network if we had it to do again.”
