It has often been said that the only way to ensure 100% security online is to cut your Internet connection.

Since that approach is hardly practical, the more realistic practice has been to secure your Internet gateway with a variety of purpose-built applications that enforce a series of checks and controls. These controls both manage your employees’ access to the outside world, and more important manage the outside world’s access to your employees.

Despite their crucial role in today’s infrastructure, however, most security systems can be tricky to configure, require constant attention and frequent updating. As a result, many companies install security software they think will keep doingt he trick well into the future, never realising that those tools may leave them vulnerable to attackers that show remarkable tenacity exploiting software vulnerabilities.

Why not let BlueFire worry about all that? After all, we’ve spent millions building a world-class enterprise infrastructure – and we’ve invested heavily in modern security solutions to protect that investment. Thanks to our Managed Security Gateway (MSG) service, all of our customers benefit from that same investment, getting a clean and safe Internet feed for their business.

Using combinations of industry-leading security solutions from Cisco, Checkpoint and Allot networks, these core network security capabilities including managed multiple firewalls, intrusion prevention and quality of service systems that inspects every packet of information entering or leaving the datacentre. This is complimented by a full suite of content security services including virus scanning, spam detection, Web content filtering, anti-spyware checking, FTP content inspection, URL filtering, worm protection and filtering of applications such as peerto-peer services, instant messaging and remote control. Remote access is supported via multiple secure options of Cisco VPN and SSL Access with RSA Dual Factor Authentication to provide travelling workers with totally secure access to your network resources.

These tools are available to any company, but MSG combines them with expertise that isn’t. Our team of specially trained security professionals, working to the guidelines of the Banking Grade Security qualification for Information Security,monitor and manage our security infrastructure 24/7 and provide technical support, monitoring, reporting, and access to breaking security news.

Providing tight Internet security isn’t easy, but we know how. By letting our experts take care of the hard part, you can rest easy that your corporate data and applications, hosted and run as part of BlueFire’s comprehensive managed services portfolio, are totally protected with a multi-layered, scalable security gateway. It’s the next best thing to cutting the cord – but a lot more useful.

Features	Description
Highly Available Internet and WAN Services	Redundancy ensures availability of links between BlueFire customers’ branch offices Fully redundant network infrastructure and environmental systems ensure internal resiliency
Managed Firewalls	Full firewall configuration and monitoring Multi-tiered firewall design allows segregation of networks with different security classifications
Managed Intrusion revention and Visibility	All inbound and outbound traffic is scanned for malicious content and surreptitious intrusion attempts in real time Accredited policies, response plans and operational procedures ensure a swift and appropriate protective response to new threats Customised reporting highlights each MSG customer’s security profile and exposure
Content Filtering	Industry-leading content scanning identifies and isolates malicious and spam emails before they get a chance to congest your inbox or damage your systems URL and Web site filtering blocks offensive and harmful content according to policies that are set and enforced at the managed gateway – and, therefore, can’t be circumvented by employees Scanning happens at BlueFire’s data centre without the need for customer intervention; all they see is a safer, cleaner Internet experience without the hassles.
Internet Peering	BlueFire’s Internet peering service enables free interchange of data between Internet service providers
Physical Security	Our highly secure physical environment has multiple layers of access control to ensure that only authorised personnel can get anywhere near our systems – and your data Highly granular access control is enforced across all of the digital assets in our environment, regardless of whether they’re accessed from inside our network or outside it
Network Backbone	BlueFire operates a high-speed, switched Gigabit Ethernet network backbone that ensures optimal performance for all of our managed services
Monitoring and Reporting	Use of enterprise reporting tools such as Netflow provide trend analysis, Layer 7 packet screening and many other features to ensure communication services are managed as effectively as possible Open and transparent reporting to customers ensures service level agreements (SLAs) are met
Quality of Service	BlueFire’s switched network infrastructure has been designed with full quality of service (QoS) capabilities QoS enables prioritisation of time-critical traffic such as voice over IP, Citrix thin-client desktop sessions, and other business critical applications – ensuring the most important functions perform at their best
Change Control	Stringent internal configuration and change control procedures ensure any requests are properly authorised Every change is assessed against potential risk to ensure nothing compromises client connectivity

This page is currently under-developement.

Your Gateway to the Internet.

Anything that wants to step through need to be authorised and approved in order to be secure and non-malicious to your business. The BlueFire Managed Security Gateway or MSG is just that a gatekeeper to the security of your business. The internet is a very large security threat and new challenges are appearing daily. The gateway includes the following components -

• Managed Firewall Services
• Managed Intrusion Prevention Services
• Content & Web Filtering
• Email Security - Anti-Spam/Virus/Phishing
• Managed Comms - Private Network Links - DSL, Ethernet, Wireless, ATM
• Monitoring & Reporting

  

Managed Intrusion Detection/Prevention Services

On the Internet, network intruders are well travelled. They come from outside the enterprise, attacking Internet connections, altering Web pages and launching denial-of-service attacks. They also originate from inside the network, casting sophisticated assaults that can circumvent or pass through firewalls, transmitting confidential information or illegally modifying network access privileges. While many organisations deploy firewalls as their central gatekeepers to prevent unauthorised access,

firewalls alone are not sufficient protection for networks or servers. A layered defence provides the best results.

BlueFire's Network and Server Based Intrusion Detection Services monitor your network and server traffic for intrusions that may occur on critical segments and servers of your infrastructure. Essentially, BLueFire watches for tell-tale signs of attack and abnormalities in network traffic that may signal an attempted intrusion.

To protect your system from these types of threats, BlueFire's experts will work with your technology staff to understand which areas of your network are strategic to your company. We use this information to architect a solution to best secure your company by placing sensors on these networks and servers, which listen for suspicious activity and maintain constant communication with our 24x7 Security Operations Centre. If we detect suspected attack activity, our operators launch notification, escalation, and remediation recommendations. These activities are tailored to your environment and the expertise of your technology staff.

As the security landscape is constantly changing, BlueFire has assembled a team of security experts to constantly upgrade our technologies and response strategies. Our extensive security resources and partnerships allow us to develop a robust knowledge base of security information. We continuously push this knowledge to our customers in the form of updates, so they can maintain up-to-date protection from malicious activity. Examples of the activities we watch for are:

• Backdoor Signatures - Hidden software or hardware mechanisms that circumvent security controls 
• O/S Exploits - Attacks specific to the operating system 
• Scans/Probes - An effort to gather information about a machine or its users in order to gain unauthorized access to the system at a later date
• Denial of Service Attacks - Inundation of hardware or a website with requests in order to deny legitimate parties access. 
• Virus-Related Activity - Anomalous network traffic resulting from a virus outbreak 
• Internet Service Exploitation - Attacks that are specific to Internet related services (Finger, FTP, NETBIOS, SMTP, TELNET,ICMP)

And remember, subscribing to Managed Intrusion Detection Services does not require purchase of hardware or software, study of technical manuals or constant updating of your systems.

Content and Web Filtering

Every day new Web-based threats add to our already demanding business environments. Protecting any organisation that relies on Internet access to conduct business has become more difficult, because along with those increasing threats. The BlueFire web-filtering solution blocks not only pornography, gambling and other inappropriate content—but also malicious code, spyware and pop-ups. This enterprise grade solution allows you to set and enforce policies with respect to threats like bandwidth- intensive streaming media, malicious mobile code, Phishing sites and adware—all serious threats to your organisation’s productivity, resources and security.

For the first time, you can protect your company from the latest Internet threats and positively impact the core area you're concerned with:

• Employee Productivity
• Network Security
• Legal Liability
• Network Resources

Because this solution is integrated into BlueFire core environment, all the processes are automatic, utilizing true Active Directory, Replication of settings across multiple servers, Remote Management, and Auto-update.

At the core of this solution is the URL Control List. This is an accurate and extremely comprehensive database of literally millions of unique Internet domains that are predefined into 50+ categories. The solution constantly scours the internet for new and changed content, classifying Web sites into different categories based on pre-defined protocols. Ultimately the accuracy of classification comes from our partner’s expert Control List Technicians.

Comprehensive Reporting

The BlueFire web filtering solution includes comprehensive reporting in a concise, browser based format. Our reporting provides the level of security insight and analysis necessary to make informed decisions about deployment, use and protection of a company’s Internet and Email resources, and how to optimise these vital resources for maximum business benefit.