Recommendations for High School Environment

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Posted by cgrady17, 05-12-2010, 07:25 PM
Hello, My high school's systems were recently hacked and nearly 75% of user passwords were changed for students. In light of that, the district has asked me for help on improving their systems. Right now they use Windows Server 2003 and Microsoft Internet Security & Acceleration Server 2004. I was wondering what would be best in terms of OS, Endpoint and gateway protection, etc. for the district if there is about 10,000 computers district-wide? Thank you for the help in advance, Connor
Posted by MikeTrike, 05-12-2010, 07:31 PM
Have you looked into Untangle? http://www.untangle.com/ Jim @ http://www.untangleappliances.com/ has setup several installations for schools in the thousands of users. As well as sold appliances to schools, private business and government branches alike. I also use an appliance at home just for the heck of it. As well as use 4 remote office appliances for a client with about 50 users per site. Now that's not 10,000 but the newer versions, including x86_64 scale well. v7.3 is in beta right now with some further performance improvements of its own.
Posted by Mike V, 05-12-2010, 07:33 PM
Wow, that's incredible. Any link to a story about this? Given the massive size of this project, you may wish to hire a local firm to fully audit the security of your network. Sometimes outside assistance is required. Unless all the servers and workstations were wiped clean, there is a good chance the intruder left a back door into the network again. That said, I've been pleased with Symantec Endpoint Protection for workstations to protect them against attacks. The built-in Windows Group Policies can also be of great assistance in getting things locked down tighter. But given the size of your district, definitely seek a company with expertise to help you. Good luck!
Posted by cgrady17, 05-12-2010, 07:49 PM
MikeTrike: Thank you, I will take a look at Untangle. @Mike V: This wasn't actually in the news, the school's administrations is keeping it pretty secret. And your probably right about having to seek outside assistance, but public schools are cheap so I don't think they're going to go for that one. And thanks for the suggestion on Symantec EndPoint, I have been considering that one.
Posted by SSD-Greg, 05-12-2010, 07:51 PM
I wish my high school would let me run all there servers. So basiclly what do they want you to do?
Posted by cgrady17, 05-12-2010, 07:52 PM
Well our IT department is horrible, anyone else at my high school is probably better than they are. They essentially just want this to never happen again, and with the specifications I said earlier their software is quite out of date. I was just looking for recommendations on what software would be best for 10,000 user environment with large activity.
Posted by cgrady17, 05-12-2010, 09:36 PM
Does anyone have any suggestions on Open Source and/or free operating systems? Perhaps Linxus based systems such as Ubuntu, or CentOS.
Posted by xtrac568, 05-13-2010, 03:16 AM
it helps if you say, what exactly got hacked, what passwords got changed, attacker did it from internal or external network so, they might need more advanced/secure firewalls, internet gateways, server hardening and network planning.
Posted by cgrady17, 05-13-2010, 04:30 PM
Student passwords were changed and the attack was internal. As I said earlier, they use Microsoft Internet Security & Acceleration Server 2004.
Posted by WebHostingNeeds, 05-15-2010, 03:02 AM
If you use operating system like ubuntu, it will be more secure. But you won't be able to run windows software on ubuntu. But there is alternative for most applications in ubuntu.

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