CheckPoint Software Case Studies Securing Virtualized Environment: A Case Study of The Chinese University of Hong Kong

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	Securing Virtualized Environment: A Case Study of The Chinese University of Hong Kong CheckPoint Software

Securing Virtualized Environment: A Case Study of The Chinese University of Hong Kong

CheckPoint Software

Technology Category	Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) - Virtual Private Cloud Wearables - Virtual Reality Glasses, Headsets & Controllers
Applicable Industries	Education National Security & Defense
Applicable Functions	Maintenance Quality Assurance
Use Cases	Inventory Management Tamper Detection
Challenge	The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK), a comprehensive research-led university, faced a significant challenge in handling massive loads of data traffic across its campus network. With its data center growing exponentially, the university turned to virtualization to optimize its server and network resources, reduce costs, and save data center real estate. However, data center virtualization came with its own set of challenges, particularly concerning security. Legacy tools often did not provide the control and visibility needed to extend protection within virtual environments. The university needed a solution that could deliver security in a dynamic environment, inspect all traffic between various virtual machines, immediately and automatically apply protection when new virtual machines were created, and provide central administration to reduce management complexities. Read More
About Customer	Established in 1963, The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) is a comprehensive research-led university delivering high-quality education on both undergraduate and postgraduate levels and serving the community with cutting-edge research. With nine colleges and eight faculties, CUHK currently has more than 20,000 undergraduate and postgraduate students and more than 6,000 teaching and administrative staff. CUHK is well known as a technology pioneer within Hong Kong’s academic sector. Read More
Solution	To address these challenges, CUHK leveraged the Check Point Security Gateway Virtual Edition (VE) in hypervisor mode. This solution provided comprehensive security for its virtualized environment, maximizing security during migration and creation of VMs or maintenance activities. It also provided immediate protection to enforce policies within its dynamic virtual environment. The solution inspected inter-VM traffic at the hypervisor level, protecting the university’s virtual environment from both external and internal threats. The Check Point Security Gateway VE was managed from the same security management console as other Check Point products, enabling CUHK to leverage its existing Check Point Management solution to provide unified control. This ensured consistency in the creation, distribution, and management of security policies across the entire IT environment, both virtualized and physical, further simplifying management, reducing costs, and streamlining processes. Read More Log in to view content
Contents

Technology Category

Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) - Virtual Private Cloud

Wearables - Virtual Reality Glasses, Headsets & Controllers

Applicable Industries

Education

National Security & Defense

Applicable Functions

Maintenance

Quality Assurance

Use Cases

Inventory Management

Tamper Detection

Challenge

The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK), a comprehensive research-led university, faced a significant challenge in handling massive loads of data traffic across its campus network. With its data center growing exponentially, the university turned to virtualization to optimize its server and network resources, reduce costs, and save data center real estate. However, data center virtualization came with its own set of challenges, particularly concerning security. Legacy tools often did not provide the control and visibility needed to extend protection within virtual environments. The university needed a solution that could deliver security in a dynamic environment, inspect all traffic between various virtual machines, immediately and automatically apply protection when new virtual machines were created, and provide central administration to reduce management complexities.

About Customer

Established in 1963, The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) is a comprehensive research-led university delivering high-quality education on both undergraduate and postgraduate levels and serving the community with cutting-edge research. With nine colleges and eight faculties, CUHK currently has more than 20,000 undergraduate and postgraduate students and more than 6,000 teaching and administrative staff. CUHK is well known as a technology pioneer within Hong Kong’s academic sector.

Solution

To address these challenges, CUHK leveraged the Check Point Security Gateway Virtual Edition (VE) in hypervisor mode. This solution provided comprehensive security for its virtualized environment, maximizing security during migration and creation of VMs or maintenance activities. It also provided immediate protection to enforce policies within its dynamic virtual environment. The solution inspected inter-VM traffic at the hypervisor level, protecting the university’s virtual environment from both external and internal threats. The Check Point Security Gateway VE was managed from the same security management console as other Check Point products, enabling CUHK to leverage its existing Check Point Management solution to provide unified control. This ensured consistency in the creation, distribution, and management of security policies across the entire IT environment, both virtualized and physical, further simplifying management, reducing costs, and streamlining processes.

Impact #1	The implementation of Check Point Security Gateway Virtual Edition (VE) provided CUHK with a comprehensive, easy-to-manage, and scalable solution. It offered complete security for its dynamic virtualized environments, including Firewall, IPS, VPN, Anti-virus, Anti-spam, URL Filtering, and Web security. The solution also simplified management by providing a single interface for both physical and virtualized environments, and tailored reporting to accelerate auditing and achieve compliance. Furthermore, the solution was extensible, allowing CUHK to protect against emerging threats with optional Software Blades and include IPS and Web security at the hypervisor level. This ensured that CUHK could keep pace with its virtualization strategy and continue to deliver high-quality education and research.

Impact #1

The implementation of Check Point Security Gateway Virtual Edition (VE) provided CUHK with a comprehensive, easy-to-manage, and scalable solution. It offered complete security for its dynamic virtualized environments, including Firewall, IPS, VPN, Anti-virus, Anti-spam, URL Filtering, and Web security. The solution also simplified management by providing a single interface for both physical and virtualized environments, and tailored reporting to accelerate auditing and achieve compliance. Furthermore, the solution was extensible, allowing CUHK to protect against emerging threats with optional Software Blades and include IPS and Web security at the hypervisor level. This ensured that CUHK could keep pace with its virtualization strategy and continue to deliver high-quality education and research.

Benefit #1	Complete virtual machine security for dynamic virtualized environments
Benefit #2	Virtual Machine (VM) deployment requires no network changes
Benefit #3	New VMs are protected with automatic security policy enforcement

Benefit #1

Complete virtual machine security for dynamic virtualized environments

Benefit #2

Virtual Machine (VM) deployment requires no network changes

Benefit #3

New VMs are protected with automatic security policy enforcement

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Overview

Securing Virtualized Environment: A Case Study of The Chinese University of Hong Kong

Operational Impact

Quantitative Benefit