SOMOS Educação, the largest K through 12 educational organization in Brazil, with more than 50 sites across Brazil, looked to McAfee for a robust, scalable endpoint security solution; simple, centralized management; and stronger protection for sensitive business and personal data. SOMOS Educação/Customer Profile

• Incorporated in 2011, SOMOSEducação (SEDU3:BZ) is thelargest K through 12 group inBrazil. It has a broad portfolioof integrated educationalsolutions (textbooks, digitalproducts, and services) andalso administers proprietaryschools and preparatorycourses.
• Industry:Education
• IT Environment:3,000 nodes, 5,000 employees,50 sites

Challenges

• Prevent both internal business data and personal data from being exfiltrated
• Reduce security management complexity in a distributed environment
• Find a security vendor that offers robust, integrated solutions and reliable support at an affordable price
• Accelerate threat detection and mitigation
• Raise security awareness among employees

McAfee Solution

• McAfee® Complete Endpoint Protection
• McAfee® DLP Endpoint
• McAfee® Drive Encryption
• McAfee® ePolicy Orchestrator® (McAfee ePO™)
• McAfee® Web Protection

Results

• An integrated, single-vendor security architecture
• Centralized and scalable single-console management
• Comprehensive, full-coverage endpoint protection
• Improved protection for sensitive data
• Greater peace of mind for parents, students, schools, and employees
• Simplified deployment 

For Juliano Pereira, CIO, and his IT colleagues at SOMOS Educação, securing sensitive data and the infrastructure is paramount to his organization’s greater mission, which is to elevate the nation of Brazil by contributing an important intangible asset: education. With the full support of the board and executive team, Pereira and his team have embarked on a journey to solidify and stabilize their cybersecurity strategy in order to better protect student information and business data and allow employees to work safely and without interruption. With a lean and efficient security team overseeing 50 sites, 3,000 nodes, and 5,000 employees distributed across Brazil, SOMOS needed a reliable vendor that could offer robust, scalable solutions, centralized management, and excellent service and support. Chief among the organization’s cybersecurity concerns are protecting against advanced threats like WannaCry ransomware, which hit several government agencies in Brazil in 2017; safeguarding business information; and preserving the privacy of the students SOMOS serves. Dissatisfied with their previous vendor because of poor service, a limited feature set, and implementation complexity, the IT leadership team at SOMOS selected McAfee as the organization’s primary security vendor based on the reputation of the McAfee brand; its connected, integrated portfolio; and the affordability of its solutions. The organization implemented McAfee endpoint security, data protection, and single-console security management. As Ricardo Costa, IT governance manager, notes, “Because many IT team members had positive experiences with McAfee in the past, it was an easy decision.” Single-Agent Endpoint Security Platform Reduces Infections and Improves Detection Pereira and his team deployed McAfee® Complete Endpoint Protection to its 3,000 endpoints in several phases over a period of only three months. The deployment was smooth and straightforward, with “zero errors,” as Marco Aurelio, IT infrastructure manager, asserts. With its single-agent architecture, McAfee Complete Endpoint Protection provides SOMOS with a single, consolidated platform that brings together multiple defenses. So far, the security team has deployed four modules. The Threat Prevention module provides intelligent, on-demand scanning and coverage for vulnerabilities and exploits. The Web Control module ensures that employees are safe when browsing the web and downloading files. And, the Firewall module leverages McAfee® Global Intelligence reputation scores to protect users from network attacks. The team has also implemented Real Protect, which uses real-time behavioral analysis and machine learning to detect advanced and zero-day threats. According to Pereira, the organization has significantly improved its ability to quickly detect malware and suspicious activities and neutralize threats. McAfee DLP Endpoint Technology Safeguards Business and Personal Information To address data protection and privacy concerns, the organization implemented McAfee DLP Endpoint, which protects data at rest, in use, and in motion across all endpoints. McAfee DLP Endpoint capabilities make it easy to categorize and map out the data that flows through the organization and apply appropriate controls and policies to relevant assets. Additionally, drive encryption combined with strong access control prevents employees from unauthorized access to confidential data on all endpoints—from desktops and laptops to tablets and USB drives. Pereira has made a point to inform employees about these new data security controls and believes that this has helped instill a greater sense of vigilance about handling sensitive data across the organization. “One of our biggest issues is possible damage to our reputation should a breach occur. I believe that implementing McAfee DLP will have a positive effect on everyone. Students and their parents will feel more at ease, and employees will be more mindful about the way they use and transmit data,” points out Willians Santos, IT security leader. McAfee ePO Simplifies Management and Increases Security Effectiveness Tying it all together is the McAfee ePO management console. Pereira’s staff can now maximize their time and efficiency by getting visibility into the organization’s entire infrastructure from a centralized single pane of glass. The easy-to-use McAfee ePO console enables the team to monitor the security health of endpoints and servers and to create and enforce data protection policies. They regularly check both built-in and customized dashboards that provide them with valuable data and statistics like the number of threat events within a defined timeframe, including names of affected hosts and types of threats. Just recently, for example, they discovered that, via the McAfee ePO console, McAfee intercepted 1,065 threats in the course of a week. Fundamental to the McAfee connected ecosystem, the McAfee ePO console has simplified security management at SOMOS Educação and has empowered its security professionals to be more effective through automation. “The single greatest benefit we’ve experienced from McAfee is the ability to use a single tool for security management, which makes it easy to scale as required. Now everyone everywhere can enjoy the same level of security,” relates Pereira. McAfee Helps Drive Technology Innovation The company has big plans for the next two years. Migration of educational services to the cloud is currently in the works. SOMOS Educação has two major instructional systems in the cloud and is negotiating with partners to implement new modules and updated versions of existing systems. They have also migrated several applications focused on student assessment, tutoring, and other learning activities. McAfee® Web Protection provides a unified defense, including antimalware, web filtering with reputation scoring, cloud application control, and real-time behavioral analysis to help prevent against zero-day threats. It provides the organization with consistent protection and policy enforcement in the cloud as well as on premises. Pereira explains that the organization is doing everything possible to strengthen its security architecture: updating and stabilizing the environment overall; investing in cutting-edge defenses for endpoints, servers, and databases; streamlining, evaluating, and testing every new security tool against potential threats; and improving technology processes. “We are at the beginning of our journey, and we still have far to go before we achieve all our goals, but we take pride in the fact that we are leading the way when it comes to cybersecurity. When our schools hear that we are providing them with stronger security, they arereally pleased and receptive. Compared to 99% of theeducational organizations in Brazil, we are way ahead ofthe game,” Pereira affirms.