Our primary purpose right now is Firewall AlgoSec Analyzer so we can ensure that our rules are nice and tight. We also use the configuration report to make sure that the firewall configuration is nice and tight.
We are starting to use modeling. AlgoSec Firewall Analyzer enables us to input details about what we would like to do to see what firewall changes would be required, if any. Also, if we are having problems with getting an application running across the network, then we can use that to establish what firewall rules might be giving us problems.
As a small branch office focused on wholesale banking, we have a very flat network that we are trying to improve upon. Over the course of last year, everything has been flat and accessible. Now, we are breaking into VLAN segmentation. That is where Firewall Analyzer will really come into good use, because it will help us to limit the traffic to only what is necessary.
We have some cloud. Our core banking is with a different organization, which is in the cloud. We also have a couple of other treasury cloud applications in the cloud. However, a fair amount of our network is within our data center and office. So, we have a hybrid model.
We are very simple. The benefit of AlgoSec Firewall Analyzer right now is to give us skills that we don't already have with our people. Also, when we get into our periodic reviews, AlgoSec enables us to do it without adding additional staff. Something that we are not able to do because that is controlled in the Chilean head office. So, we need to make the best use of the best tools to secure our environment with a minimal number of people.
AlgoSec reduced the time it takes to implement firewall rules in our organization. Before, our firewall rule review was always done manually. When we installed the appliance and ran the report, we quickly found half a dozen areas where we were more exposed than we needed to be. The manual process used to go on for weeks. The AlgoSec process right now, as we develop and become better with it, takes only a matter of two or three days. We can have a good solid review, then we can get into very specific details about any rule or configuration with the objective of ensuring least privilege. Only the things that are needed to support business activities are allowed.
We are a regulated industry: financial services. We are obliged to at least annually review our firewall rules for risk. Are they too permissive? Are they not needed? Because we have this tool, we can now do that once a quarter. Before, we only did it once a year.
We are a small branch of a much larger organization in Latin America. The rules that were set up allow free flow of information back and forth, i.e., network connections. Right now, with ransomware being what it is, we are starting to review those rules because they are too permissive. Another way that AlgoSec is helping us, internally, is working with our head office to make sure that they are treated with least privilege. Something that is not normal. Something that didn't happen, "Just because."
I have been with this organization for about two years. All the wide-openness of the network communications was just a bad event waiting to happen. AlgoSec Firewall Analyzer has given us the great ability to dig down into the details and work at a level above the skills that we already have, making sure that we are in a process. It started months ago and will continue for seven more months. That network traffic in and out of our perimeter is the least that it should be.
We work with multiple security vendors. For just IT alone, we have three primary vendors and a couple others that pitch in when needed. AlgoSec Firewall Analyzer helps us to make sure that we allow only what they need and that we keep them to the internal assets. They are external third-parties. We have high assurance that they are only able to access network assets that are part of the contract. Another vendor manages our firewall. The reason we have them do it is because we don't have the expertise amongst our people. So, the addition of the AlgoSec Firewall Analyzer enables us to have the intelligence of what is good and what is less than good. Thus, we can help keep that third-party on the rails, that they are doing good things for us, and we have the evidence to prove it.
We are getting into using AlgoSec to implement and manage micro-segmentation initiatives. One of our audit concerns was the flat network, and we started to work based on what we already know to create a test segment. However, AlgoSec is helping us to validate the traffic that will be allowed into that new segment, restricted to only that which we need. No sense in creating an isolated network if bad things can still flow back and forth between test and production. So, AlgoSec is a tool that is helping us make sure that we have all the isolation that we need. But, because of the syslog counters, we can also tell over time whether we did a good job in the first place and whether the remaining rules that we configured to be nice and tight are still needed for business purposes.