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The Challenge
The Forestry Corporation of NSW manages more than two million hectares of State forests. Its activities range from replanting and regrowing 40 million trees a year, producing timber to build Australia’s homes, caring for bushland and wildlife, and facilitating recreation and ecotourism across over 500 State forests. Their technology team was looking for better ways to secure their network against cyber threats and provide an enhanced experience for users.
- Mitigating cyber threats – as a government agency, it is imperative for Forestry Corporation of NSW to protect its network from cyber attacks including malware, ransomware, phishing, spamming, data theft and other malicious threats,
- Content control for users – enforcing restrictions on inappropriate websites and content, and approving the type of accessible websites while denying access to other types were critical and
- Implementation of a security solution that needed to be self-manageable, user-friendly, and easy to deploy.
“We needed a solution which could be intuitive and easy to integrate with our network. Averting cyber threats and web filters were our priority,” said Steve Wright, Networks and Security Manager at Forestry Corporation of NSW.
The Solution
Forestry Corporation of NSW’s technology team was introduced to Telstra Secure Web, a cloud-based service for web and email that uses proactive network scanning to protect against phishing, malware, ransomware and impersonation attacks.
After using the solution for several years, Forestry Corporation of NSW decided to upgrade to Telstra’s latest Secure Web solution built on Cisco Umbrella. By delivering security at the DNS layer, the service stops threats before they ever reach the network or endpoints. Telstra and Forestry Corporation of NSW worked together to migrate all the data to the new platform within days with no transition pitfalls or complexities encountered.
- Migrated the data securely to the new platform with no data loss,
- Deployed a self-managed platform for the customer’s technology team, to have more control over their solution and
- Enabled a simple yet holistic security solution, to help safeguard the network against cyber threats.
Telstra Secure Web has provided a reliable security solution for Forestry Corporation of NSW with zero reported cyberattacks to date.
- No security threats to date with comprehensive protection
- All employees easily migrated to the new platform within days
- Zero interruptions to productivity during migration
“We are absolutely delighted with this latest security suite” said Steve Wright, Networks and Security Manager at Forestry Corporation of NSW. “This is a great resource. We have full visibility and can go into the platform, investigate and find when and what activity has occurred. This was one of the easiest security solutions to implement and manage. It was seamless while migrating data from the previous platform.”
Lessons
The solution assisted the Forestry Corporation of NSW to:
- Protect critical information and minimise reputational risk by blocking cyber threats before they became issues,
- Improve productivity and efficiency by reducing unwanted internet traffic and protecting employees from attacks and
- Deliver a better user experience by upgrading to the latest Telstra Secure Web platform powered by Cisco Umbrella.
