Automated Network Provisioning and Security at The Courtauld Institute of Art

Khipu Networks, provider of Cyber Security Solutions within the Education sector, announce that The Courtauld Institute of Art has implemented Bradford Networks’ Network Sentry Solution to secure and manage their network. The Courtauld Institute of Art selected Network Sentry to control access to their current network and ensure secure connectivity.

Prior to selecting Bradford Networks, The Courtauld Institute of Art had problems monitoring who or what was accessing their network; students and visitors alike were able to directly connect any device to the network, which in turn presented further administrative problems and compliance issues. They had an in-house registration solution for their wireless network, but not for their wired estate, and therefore had no visibility or control over who or what was connecting into it. Whatever solution The Courtauld Institute of Art selected, it needed to ensure secure connectivity within their new halls of residence, as well as securing their onsite campus network.

Before selecting Network Sentry, The Courtauld Institute of Art reviewed a number of network access control (NAC) technologies, including solutions from Sophos, Cisco and Forescout. Khipu’s submission to The Courtauld Institute of Art included a NAC deployment model that was based on 6 years’ experience of implementing the Bradford Networks solution into Education environments. Bradford’s Network Sentry solution fulfilled all of their requirements, especially the ‘dissolvable agent’ scanning technology, which provides students with an extra level of security by enforcing compliance without the need to have an ever-present agent installed on a device not owned by the Institution. “We were looking for a way to secure our physical network and provide more security and control over our wireless LAN. We reviewed a wide variety of products and Bradford Campus Manager was selected with Khipu Networks the provider. This unique solution has been an excellent fit, improving our service delivery for students and staff and making life easier for the IT Staff. The support and aftercare from Khipu has been invaluable and of high quality. They are a company that we will continue to work with and invite to tender for other projects within their sphere of expertise.” Commented Alasdair Sowerby, IT Manager at The Courtauld Institute of Art. The Courtauld Institute of Art had an extensive set of criteria that the selected technology had to fulfil such as;

• Must be flexible enough for their network and support future expansion / scalability.
• Ability to VLAN quarantine unknown, threat devices i.e. ‘rogues’.
• Integration with our current systems (MS Active Directory, Fortigate Firewall, Dell powerconnect switches and Linksys wireless network).
• Ease of use for students/staff
• Dissolvable agent: nothing to install or any complex scan requirements.
• Ease of administration for IT Staff

After a successful install in October 2009, The Courtauld Institute of Art are planning to expand their solution to include the roll out of remote registration, whereby students can register in advance without needing to be on Campus. “The support from Khipu has been invaluable. It’s also good that they have been able to provide support on our firewall, as it integrates with the Bradford solution. Visibility has been a huge bonus; it’s useful to be able to see where a device was connected and when, and to track devices on our network, finding out who was using specific IP address, etc. We were also able to determine how many Wireless Mac vs PC users we actually have; previously we could only do this with live devices by checking on the Access points.” Summarised Sowerby.

About The Courtauld Institute of Art (www.courtauld.ac.uk)

The Courtauld Institute of Art is one of the world’s leading centres for the study of the history and conservation of art and architecture, and its Gallery houses one of Britain’s best-loved collections. Based at Somerset House, The Courtauld is an independent college of the University of London.

About Khipu Networks

Khipu Networks are a Cyber Security Solutions provider who have a large presence within the Education Sector, providing Network Access, Visibility and Control solutions. With over 10 years’ experience and 400+ Education customer deployments, we have specialist expertise in meeting the challenges when providing an open, flexible but secure network environment to students, staff and visitors.