Introduction
Our client operates multiple regulated securities and derivative markets, including one in the UK. Their electronic trading platform connects the world’s largest investment banks, trading firms, and brokerages, processing large volumes of trades each day. With an increasing amount of business-critical data being provided online, a cyber-ready firewall is essential to securing their network.
The Challenge
The financial industry is facing an unprecedented increase in network attacks, as cybercriminals target its wealth of sensitive data. To combat this, financial institutions need to upgrade to next-generation firewalls that are both comprehensive and cost-effective.
Our client was looking to replace its existing on-premise web application firewall (WAF) solution when the support contract expired. Babble proposed a Proof-of-Concept (POC) process to fully evaluate the capabilities of the WAF solutions under consideration. Shortlisted were two solutions: the incumbent vendor’s virtual appliance-based WAF and Babble’s recommended Cloud-Based WAF solution.
To fully explore the capabilities of the cloud-based WAF platform it was important to mirror the configuration of the existing WAF solution and to integrate the solution into the organization’s SIEM (Security Incident Event Management) system.
The client had a system that could be used as a POC target, but they needed help coordinating and managing the POC process. They also needed assistance from a cloud-based WAF to convert the configuration from their existing solution and integrate it with their SIEM system.
The Solution
The proof-of-concept (POC) process clearly demonstrated the superiority of the cloud-based WAF solution over the incumbent legacy platform. The client was impressed by its ease of deployment, integration with existing management systems, and significant value.
Because of the way that the POC had been set up, the scope was easily expanded over a couple of weeks to include additional systems, delivering the observed benefits across the board, and maximizing the return on investment.
Our client selected Babble’s recommended Cloud WAF solution over their incumbent on-premise web application firewall solution because:
- It offers a next-generation WAF architecture and a user interface that is easy to use, even for non-experts.
- The solution integrated easily with their existing SIEM, could be deployed quickly, and immediately improved the security posture of the systems being protected.
- It is cost-effective and offers strong SOC-based technical support as part of the managed service.
- It offers a unique solution that provides local management and control of SSL cert keys with the scalability of a cloud solution.
