International leader in construction materials, Lafarge, operating in 75 countries on five continents, has started its roll-out of SmoothWall security products into Africa.
SmoothWall is a leading Internet security provider now protecting over half a million networks worldwide. With its specialist development team, SmoothWall has harnessed years of technical expertise to develop a suite of firewall, virtual private network (VPN), content filtering, e-mail security and bandwidth management solutions used by SMEs, large corporate organisations and educational institutions, such as Computer Associates, Oxford University, General Motors and now Lafarge.
Basil Wabomba, Africa Regional Network Supervisor, says: "Lafarge is a world leader in cement and other building materials and operates in 10 countries in Africa. There has been a need to centralise IT services in Africa to leverage on common services, cut costs and improve infrastructure. To achieve these goals, we looked around for a product that would blend well as a firewall, Internet proxy and a Web filter for medium-size to large business units at a cost-effective price. SmoothWall Advanced firewall provided the answer to these questions."
Advanced Firewall is the integrated security solution for enterprise networks. Combining the functions of a perimeter firewall and an internal network firewall, Advanced Firewall controls external and local user access to physically segregated network zones and servers; providing maximum security against both external and internal threats. The integrated VPN gateway authenticates and protects wireless users, as well as offering site-to-site IPSec connectivity and secure remote access for mobile users. SmoothWall Advanced Firewall exploits the power, reliability and versatility of high performance server hardware to provide a cost-effective firewall of unrivalled performance and flexibility.
The modular nature of Advanced Firewall, combined with the wide range of supported hardware, allows users to specify a solution to suit any security requirement. Add-on modules further extend the capabilities of Advanced Firewall including Bandwidth management, SmoothZap (Email Security and Anti-Virus Module) and Web Content filtering solutions, such as SmoothGuardian which was also added to Lafarge`s Advanced Firewall. SmoothGuardian works with the Microsoft Active Directory/LDAP user authentication capability of Advanced Firewall to set filtering policies according to Windows user group membership. SmoothWall Guardian Web security solutions are the answer to the problem of employee Internet misuse. Guardian will restrict access to time-wasting sites, block pornography and other objectionable content, as well as prevent the download of copyright music and files infected with viruses or spyware.
Its Dynamic Content Analysis technology detects in-page spyware and Trojan exploits, which differentiates Guardian from other Web content filters. Guardian examines the actual content of each Web page to determine what is good and what is to be blocked. A simple URL blocklist, no matter how large, can never be complete or totally up-to-date. Dynamic Content Analysis works for every Web page in existence, regardless of whether Guardian has ever seen or categorised the page before.
Wabomba added: "So far, we have deployed SmoothWall at three sites in South Africa, Nigeria and Zambia. Deployment has been phenomenal with the primary solution provided by Jeshurun Consulting. Building on this overwhelming success, we are in the process of deploying SmoothWall Advanced firewall to a couple of other Lafarge sites in Africa and around the world."
SmoothWall offers a range of feature-rich, robust security products that are cost-effective and cater for different organisation structures from those with limited IT security resources to larger SMEs and corporations while also offering discounted products to educational institutions. The modular architecture allows an entry-level corporate firewall system to grow in line with company requirements, via the range of add-on modules that extend the firewall platform into a robust, flexible security solution. SmoothWall offers the facility of a free 30-day evaluation copy of its products, for those interested in evaluating the products.
Jeshurun Consulting is the local reseller of SmoothWall in South Africa, and is able to assist you with your queries and arranging of evaluations. Kindly contact Abri Krige at 021 9141402, abri@jeshurun.co.za or visit the Web site at www.jeshurun.co.za.
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