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Palo Alto Networks Defends Critical City Services and Schools for Staunton, Virginia

Posted on: Tuesday, 15 July 2008, 09:00 CDT

Palo Alto Networks today announced that City of Staunton, Virginia is using the PA-4000 Series next-generation firewall to combat threats and gain visibility and control of Internet applications running throughout the city's entire information infrastructure. The deployment anchors a significant upgrade aimed at ensuring the reliable and safe delivery of services from police and fire to tax collection. The city is also using the PA-4000 Series to protect its students from exposure to inappropriate or dangerous content.

With more than 20 public schools and a pioneering history in progressive government, Staunton, Virginia faces the difficult task of accommodating new Web 2.0 applications while protecting the integrity of its networks and the privacy and safety of its citizens. The legacy firewall infrastructure was proving wholly inadequate, with malware infections driving skyrocketing support costs. Moreover, evasive applications were draining bandwidth and creating risks of regulatory non-compliance - which could jeopardize federal funding.

"Our challenge is governing the safe and productive use of the city's information infrastructure for a user base that ranges from government employees to K-12 students," said Kurt Plowman, Chief Technology Officer for the city. "Our legacy firewall simply couldn't deliver in terms of performance or visibility. The PA-4000 Series keeps pace easily, and provides a level of visibility and control that translates into real and enforceable acceptable use policies."

"Our previous security infrastructure couldn't effectively deal with today's ever-changing threats, nor could it control evasive applications like anonymizers, proxies and Skype," said Tom Lundquist, IT Manager for Staunton City schools. "Not only did Palo Alto Networks give us visibility and control over the applications running on our network, the PA-4000 Series also enables us to consolidate our security infrastructure. Now, one policy engine governs all applications, users and content."

"Network users - whether they're business people or students - are the top priority, the most valuable resource," said Steve Mullaney, Vice President of Marketing for Palo Alto Networks. "But, they also represent the greatest vulnerability. If you can't see and understand exactly what users and applications are doing - the battle is already lost. Palo Alto's products provide what IT needs to keep users, and business, safe."

About Palo Alto Networks

Palo Alto Networks(TM) enables visibility and policy control of applications and content running on enterprise networks. Based on innovative App-ID(TM) application classification technology, the Palo Alto Networks family of next-generation firewalls accurately identifies applications - regardless of port, protocol, evasive tactic or even SSL encryption - at 10Gbps with no performance degradation. Enterprises can now set and enforce application usage policies to meet compliance requirements, improve threat mitigation and lower operational costs. For more information, visit www.paloaltonetworks.com.

Palo Alto Networks, the Palo Alto Networks Logo and App-ID are trademarks of Palo Alto Networks, Inc. in the United States. All other trademarks, trade names or service marks used or mentioned herein belong to their respective owners.

Source: Business Wire

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