The Challenge
In the face of ever-evolving cyber threats, Kildare County Council needed ongoing threat monitoring and remediation it its IT network to reduce cyber risk for the organisation and to relieve pressure on its internal IT team.
Kildare County Council required a solution that would mitigate cyberattacks and the costs associated with recovering from such an attack. The organisation also needed to decrease the number of helpdesk tickets being raised by employees for routine IT tasks such as user account unlocks and password resets.
The Solution
Following extensive consultation, Paradyn delivered a tailored security information and event management (SIEM) solution – ManageEngine Log360 – to Kildare County Council. The solution monitors network activity and detects threats trying to penetrate the network across areas including servers, endpoints, firewalls, the Office 365 environment, and Active Directory.
A security operations centre (SOC) service was also deployed to provide 24x7x365 monitoring and remediation of potential threats within the Council. In addition, Paradyn implemented ManageEngine ADSelfService which enables over 700 employees to carry out their own account unlocks and password resets. The tool also supports 20 administration accounts for server multi-factor authentication (MFA) logins.
The Outcome
Round-the-clock monitoring by Paradyn’s security analysts and SOC engineers has created a more secure IT environment for Kildare County Council which, in turn, is enhancing the vital services it provides to almost 250,000 citizens in Kildare. The SIEM and SOC services have vastly reduced the risk of a successful cyberattack or data breach for the organisation which is protecting sensitive data for the Council’s employees and the citizens it serves.
Approximately 200 million events are processed by the SIEM on a weekly basis, which gives peace of mind that activities across the infrastructure are being continually monitored (including out-of-hours) and reduces the risk of burnout for the IT team.
In addition, ADSelfService allows end users to unlock accounts and reset passwords on demand without the need to engage IT support technicians. This reduces the number of helpdesk tickets raised and, in turn, reduces the time (and associated costs) that support technicians spend carrying out these basic but time-consuming functions.
Monthly review meetings are held to maintain SIEM and SOC reporting standards and Paradyn carries out ongoing software support and maintenance for the Council. The organisation has also scaled up its use of the SIEM solution, adding more log events and increasing the number of systems being monitored as it continues to expand.
Paul Lynam, IS Project Leader, Kildare County Council: “As a trusted IT partner, Paradyn was the natural fit to support on this next phase of our journey. The team has deep cybersecurity and data protection expertise, and the reliability of their customer support is crucial in the event of an incident. The enhanced service gives us the confidence to continue to roll out our services to citizens in Kildare, safe in the knowledge that our IT environment is fully protected.”
