Chester Zoo protects critical IT infrastructure

Chester Zoo, home to more than 11,000 animals and the UK’s most popular destination for wildlife lovers, has deployed WatchGuard Technologies’ integrated security platforms for unified threat management (UTM). Designed to protect the Zoo’s networks and data across its 110-acre site in Cheshire, the WatchGuard platforms provide intrusion prevention and intrusion detection, along with Web 2.0 application filtering and SSL VPN support for secure remote access.

Attracting more than 1.4 million visitors per year, it takes nearly 350 full time employees and more than 250 seasonal staff to run Chester Zoo and support the protection of endangered animals around the world through conservation and education activities. IT support is delivered by a fully virtualised server farm on a 10Gb backbone network, with 1Gb fibre to PCs in the majority of locations across the Zoo. As well as some 175 desktop computers, there are more than 100 PC-based EPOS (electronic point of sale) terminals for entrance tickets, shops and catering.

“When we decided to upgrade our network security, we wanted the best possible solution to meet our needs,” said Martin King, IT Manager at Chester Zoo. “With good IPS (Intrusion Prevention Service) and IDS (Intrusion Detection System) as key requirements, along with better logging and reporting, WatchGuard Technologies was the only vendor that ticked all our boxes for the functionality we needed going forward and also offered the most competitive price.”

WatchGuard’s integrated security platform with UTM combines strong firewall and VPN protection with a powerful range of subscription-based security services. For example, IPS uses continually updated signatures to detect and block all types of threats in real time, while application control provides fine-grained control of more than 1,800 applications and even individual functions such as chat. The security platforms were supplied and installed by Chester Zoo’s IT solutions provider and WatchGuard partner, Concorde IT Group. “Concorde helped us at every stage of the process – even coming to do the install at 5:00 am in the morning – and ongoing management is straight-forward and intuitive for our IT department team,” added Martin King.

"To combat today’s increasingly sophisticated threats, organisations need consolidated solutions that provide many layers of security, including an application-layer firewall, advanced IPS solution, proactive AV, and much more, in one easy to manage solution,” said Corey Nachreiner, WatchGuard’s director of security strategy. “WatchGuard’s next generation XTM appliances easily deliver these defence-in-depth capabilities to customers like Chester Zoo, while also offering many real-time visibility and analytic tools that provide the security and business intelligence businesses need to detect and respond to threats against their organisation.”