Organization

Stanford University has one of the most extensive IT infrastructures of any U.S. university. Stanford's Information Technology Systems and Services (ITSS) organization manages the computing infrastructure of thousands of individual systems and machines across numerous departments. In 2003, Stanford determined that it needed a security model to protect against the rising costs and downtime associated with worms and viruses.

Situation

"Our philosophy at Stanford is that all technology investments need to provide maximum value while using minimal resources from a time and resource perspective," said Ced Bennet, emeritus director, information security services at Stanford. "In 2003, we recognized that a key initiative was to deploy a solution to maintain the desktops and laptops in our extensive computing environment. A key criteria in our evaluation was that the solution be easy to deploy and deliver comprehensive and centralized oversight from a single console."

Solution

Talk about a smart solution. Stanford University uses the BigFix Enterprise Suite (BES) to manage system vulnerabilities across thousands of desktops, laptops and servers. BES is designed to allow users to gain central, automation-assisted control over the escalating complexity of keeping its computing infrastructure secure from a wide range of vulnerabilities.

Result

Stanford is deploying BES on approximately 25,000 computers throughout its network. Stanford plans to leverage BigFix Patch Manager to help reduce the time and costs involved in keeping computers correctly updated and secure via a centralized management process.