Sutton Valence School Selects ForeScout CounterACT™ to Secure Campus Network
November 2008 by Marc Jacob
ForeScout Technologies, Inc. announced that Sutton Valence School (SVS), a co-educational independent day and boarding school for ages 3 to 18, has deployed a CounterACT™ NAC appliance across its campus network to ensure compliance and protect against self-propagating threats.
Established in 1576 and set in the beautiful surroundings of the Kent countryside, SVS is one of the oldest public schools in the UK. Incorporating a senior and a preparatory school, the SVS network connects staff, pupils and guests within 15 buildings and one branch location. SVS is now using the ForeScout CT-1000 appliance to protect 1,000 on-campus devices.
Mark Gosden, Network Manager at Sutton Valence School, said: “We chose CounterACT because it enables us to protect our network from potentially damaging, unknown machines brought onsite by boarding school students and then connected to our network. The main benefit since its deployment is that we no longer run the risk of our students flooding the network with viruses and other internet-based threats, as CounterACT continuously scans each laptop for malware and alerts students, when necessary, to update their anti-virus solutions. With such a high number of new boarding students joining us each term from countries around the world, the type and scale of threats brought onto the network can be vast.”
He continued: “In essence, we made our decision to buy ForeScout’s CounterACT as it performed exactly as we wanted, at a lower cost compared to the competition.”
Sutton Valence has recently opened a new presentation theatre on campus. Though the theatre is a wonderful asset for the school, it brings additional security risks when guest speakers plug-in their laptops and require network access. ForeScout’s CT-1000 protects against these types of threats, helping to optimise uptime and availability of the school’s network.