Case Study: SurfControl Helps St. Margaret's Health Ensure Business and Regulatory Compliance
By Dan Femino, TECHNICAL ADVISOR TO THE CEO - SURFCONTROL

St. Margaret's Health: Caring with Dignity & Compassion

Established over 100 years ago, St. Margaret's Health provides holistic quality health care services to the communities of the Illinois valley. In union with the Sisters of Mary the Presentation, St. Margaret' Health is committed to a mission of healing. Central to St. Margaret's Health longevity are the values of dignity and compassion in caring for the needs of patients, their families, the community and one another. St. Margaret's Health is sponsored by the Sisters of Mary of the Presentation and the SMP Health system.

Situation

Like other U.S. healthcare organizations, St. Margaret's Health is required to comply with federal health and safety regulations. Under the Health Insurance Portability Accountability Act (HIPAA), St. Margaret's Health must ensure the confidentiality of patient information and be able to verify accountability over time. With ever-increasing malicious, yet disguised, Internet threats, users can easily compromise critical information and the network at large without knowing it.

"It's my responsibility to empower employees to do their jobs via the Internet and network tools provided, without putting other employees, patients or the network itself at risk," explains John Sabotta, MIS director for St. Margaret's Health.

Solution: SurfControl Web Filter & E-mail Filter

St. Margaret's Health selected SurfControl Web Filter and E-mail Filter to help ensure that employee e-mail and Web-based activities are in alignment with both their internal Internet acceptable usage policy (AUP) and HIPAA requirements. SurfControl Web Filter and E-mail Filter provide the hospital with advanced content filtering technology, 24/7 risk recognition, flexible policy controls and proactive updates. Together, these two SurfControl products deliver an integrated, cost-effective solution that helps St. Margaret's Health to protect their patient, employee and business information.

Benefits

Business Integrity

SurfControl provides an Internet protection solution that helps St. Margaret's Health to gain control over inappropriate inbound and outbound Web and e-mail activity. "With SurfControl, I do not have to worry about people with Internet access going out and clicking on something that downloads spyware. SurfControl has allowed us to reduce the risk of keyloggers and similar malicious threats to virtually zero," says Sabotta.

An example of how St. Margaret's Health was able to maintain business integrity and ensure employee productivity occurred on a weekend. During that two-day period, St. Margaret's Health was the target of over 5,000 spam e-mails, ranging from on-line pharmaceuticals to phishing attempts for employees' banking information. If those messages had reached the internal e-mail server, it would have created an enormous load, as the server is configured to identify false addresses and reply with an automatic response to the sender. In addition, employees would have had an unnecessary, time-consuming chore cleaning out their inboxes Monday morning.

"SurfControl E-mail Filter immediately blocked 100 percent of those 5,000 spam e-mails, so they never got through to our server or our employees," says Sabotta. "Looking back to the time when we installed E-mail Filter v5.0, it was almost miraculous. People were actually shaking my hand, saying they weren't getting any spam anymore."

Efficient, Customizable Reporting

Sabotta also appreciates the ease of reporting and flexibility of SurfControl products. On a monthly basis, he automatically generates and e-mails user activity and blockage reports to managers, administrative heads and the CEO. If anyone needs more information, Sabotta can quickly and easily follow up with more detail, based on all the categories included with SurfControl E-mail Filter and Web Filter.

"With SurfControl I can customize our filtering and reporting to align with the way our organization operates," says Sabotta. "Since I can automate the distribution of my monthly reports, and set permissions for other managers to easily and reliably run their own reports, both SurfControl E-mail Filter and Web Filter save me a lot of time each month."

Technical Expertise, Support and Value

With the ever-increasing and complex Internet threat landscape, it is even more important for solution providers to scale to evolving organizational needs and regulatory requirements. "We looked for a company that would be a fit for us not only in terms of the product itself, but also in terms of support and value, says Sabotta. "We did not see anything even close to what SurfControl does in those three areas."

"SurfControl plays an integral role in protecting our organization from accidental employee-invoked threats as well as malicious threats outside our organization," concludes Sabotta. "We are thrilled with what SurfControl has done for us."

For more information about SurfControl, visit www.surfcontrol.com or contact Lou Guerriero at 831-332-0967 or via email at lou.guerriero@surfcontrol.com.

About the Author

As a Distinguished Engineer and Technical Advisor to the CEO at SurfControl, Dan Femino is responsible for a variety of strategic project initiatives, as well as keeping SurfControl's CEO appropriately apprised of new and emerging technical trends. Mr. Femino joined SurfControl in 2002 as a systems engineer, a role that took him routinely into the field allowing him to utilize his technical expertise and to develop an affinity for servicing customers. He later became SurfControl's Director of Systems Engineering, responsible for the management of all North American field engineers. Mr. Femino has more than 13 years of professional experience. Before joining SurfControl, he held technical positions with technology leaders including Nortel Networks and 3Com. He is a graduate of Holy Cross in Massachusetts.