Office Of The Deputy Prime Minister Deploys Enhanced Network Security Solution To Eliminate Virus Attacks

OSWESTRY, SHROPSHIRE, 14 APRIL, 2004 - The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister (ODPM), Regional Co-ordination Unit (RCU) has deployed an enhanced network security solution to protect all Regional Government Offices throughout the UK from virus attacks. Designed, installed and managed by Total Network Solutions, it uses Fortinet's award-winning FortiGate™ series of ASIC-accelerated Antivirus Firewalls, which in the first month alone have prevented all attacks from entering the Government network including MyDoom, NetSky, Bagel and the Nachi virus.

The RCU has standardised on the FortiGate-400 Antivirus Firewall for all 15 of its regional government offices, protecting 2500 users from the most damaging contentbased threats from email and web traffic such as viruses, worms, intrusions, inappropriate web content, etc. This is achieved in real time at the network edge without reducing network performance. Total Network Solutions is also providing 24-hour management of antivirus updates to upload new virus definitions as soon as a new virus has been detected in the wild. This will ensure that the solution is kept up to date and providing maximum protection against even the latest viruses.

"The sheer scalability and breadth of the FortiGate platform was a key reason for deploying the systems throughout our network," commented Chris Benefield, Senior ICT Project & Account Manager of the Regional Co-ordination Unit. "The products offer total network and content protection with antivirus, intrusion detection, VPN, content filtering and anti-spam capabilities provided in a single, integrated solution."

Should a virus be introduced to the network via an infected floppy disk or laptop, the FortiGate Antivirus Firewall automatically stops it from infecting other sites on the network or being transmitted to other government departments. They also pinpoint any
infected machines on the network for isolation and cleansing. The systems include a high-availability port and fail-over logic to support redundant configurations, making them ideal for mission-critical applications and environments.

About the Regional Co-ordination Unit
The Government Offices for the Regions (GOs) and their corporate centre, the Regional Co-ordination Unit (RCU) are playing an increasingly pivotal role at the heart of Government. Their responsibility for delivering policy in the regions and their multi-Departmental constitution make them ideally placed to implement crosscutting initiatives, and to advise Departments on successful implementation strategies at regional and local level. Since May 2002 the RCU and GOs have been part of the newly-formed department, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister (ODPM).

About Fortinet (www.fortinet.com)
Fortinet's award-winning FortiGate™ series of ASIC-accelerated antivirus firewalls, winner of the 2003 Networking Industry Awards Firewall Product of the Year, are the new generation of real-time network protection systems. They detect and eliminate the most damaging, content-based threats from email and Web traffic such as viruses, worms, intrusions, inappropriate Web content and more in real time – without degrading network performance. FortiGate systems, the only security products that are quadruple-certified by the ICSA (antivirus, firewall, IPSec, NIDS), deliver a full range of network-level and application-level services in integrated, easily managed platforms. Named to the Chunghwa Customer Win Release - 4
“Visionaries” category in the 2003 Gartner Enterprise Firewall Magic Quadrant, Fortinet is privately held and based in Sunnyvale, California.

About Total Network Solutions
Formed in 1991, Total Network Solutions is a leading provider of communications solutions and services and has recently been acknowledged by Dun & Bradstreet as being the 59th fastest growing company in the UK. The company is a Fortinet Platinum Partner and was one of the first UK-based companies to achieve BS7799-2 security standard accreditation for its network management services which support its ‘best of breed’ communications solutions. These have been provided to organisations operating in many different markets in the UK and offshore and include British Airways, Abbey National Offshore and the London Internet Exchange along with many parts of the public sector.