Harvey Nichols

Industry: Retail

Location: United Kingdom

Products Used: Web Security, Hosted Email Security

Harvey Nichols Harvey Nichols Minimises Corporate Risk and Maximises Employee Productivity With Websense^® Web Security and Websense Hosted Email Security

Harvey Nichols is one of the world’s most recognisable luxury brands. Originally founded as a linen shop in London in 1813, Harvey Nichols has stores in the U.K., Dubai, Hong Kong, Istanbul, and Jakarta, as well as restaurants in London (Oxo Tower and the Prism).

The Problem

What’s in a name?

As a world-renowned brand, Harvey Nichols is concerned that the company, and more importantly its name, is safeguarded at all times against litigation and undesirable threats. With blended Web and email threats on the increase, the IT team has to protect the network from malicious software and ensure employee Web access is safe, secure, and productive to the business.

“Our company name is our biggest asset,” says Lee Smith, IT operations manager, Harvey Nichols. “We can’t afford to have the Harvey Nichols brand associated with scandal, offense, or inappropriate behavior. It’s therefore important that our network is protected both from external threats and potential internal threats. The last thing we would want, for example, is to have Harvey Nichols associated with an inappropriate email that’s been circulated or be taken to court because of something accessed on the Internet whilst at work.”

Harvey Nichols had been using a Web filtering solution but found that it didn’t offer the level of flexibility that was required. Spam levels were also on the increase and spam was getting through to employee inboxes. This was inconveniencing users and demanded additional administration time from the IT department.

The Solution

To better protect and manage Internet access, email security and in-house resources, Smith decided to replace their current Web filtering solution with Websense® Web Security and to move to an outsourced email solution with Websense Hosted Email Security.

Eliminate spam with Websense Hosted Email Security

The hosted security model reduces costs and complexity while protecting from converged email and Web 2.0 threats and eliminating uncertainty through industry-leading service level agreements. With Websense Hosted Email Security, Harvey Nichols ended its ongoing battle with spam and viruses, and realized a consolidated security strategy with the trusted leader in Essential Information Protection™. Lee Smith was pleased to see that the results were immediate:

“Our previous solution wasn’t working out for us,” says Smith. “We had loads of spam to deal with, the product was constantly failing and we were spending a disproportionate amount of time trying to manage the situation. With a small IT team we felt the best option was to use a hosted solution from Websense. Once we had Websense Hosted Email Security in place the spam was gone almost instantly.”

Websense Hosted Email Security analyses millions of emails and Web requests every day, detecting malware patterns as they emerge in real time, protecting organisations from attack long before traditional antivirus technology is even aware of the threat. Retaining control is easy with 24/7 access and flexible customization of policies, configuration settings, quarantine management, and reporting. An administrator can control corporate email policy, increase security and reduce legal liability by ensuring compliance with regulations and privacy standards.

“Websense enables us to establish a culture of accountability, stopping users from making silly mistakes by accidentally sending inappropriate emails which could go to a customer or another external stakeholder and harm our reputation,” says Smith. “With Websense we can block questionable emails and send a notice back to the user alerting them that the message is in breach of corporate policy.”

Websense Hosted Email Security also allows Harvey Nichols to implement additional safeguards such as blocking attachments including video, audio, and mp3 files. This prevents the inadvertent opening and executing of infected email attachments or downloaded applications, which could spread viruses through the network.

Harvey Nichols is working toward accreditation to the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS). Websense is a component in the solution, which enables them to prevent credit card fraud, hacking and various other security vulnerabilities and threats.

Maximise productivity and minimise threats with Websense Web Security

Establishing responsible employee Internet use was another key objective for Harvey Nichols.

“We chose Websense because we wanted to have the confidence that the solution was definitely going to stop everything we did not want going through,” says Smith. “In the old days we resorted to spot checking employee PCs to make sure that they had not been accessing inappropriate sites or downloading illegally copyright material. Today this is not an option of course both from a regulatory point of view and from a practical perspective. You really need to stop this activity from happening in the first place.”

Websense Web Security is now used to manage more than 1,500 Internet users at Harvey Nichols. “The installation process was really easy,” says Smith. “We were able to test the product quickly and then put it into a live environment almost immediately.”

Websense Web Security enables Harvey Nichols to ensure corporate Internet use is in line with corporate policy. Harvey Nichols can flexibly manage access to online advertisements, message boards, freeware/software downloads, online trading sites, instant messaging and pay-to-surf sites — all of which can be significant productivity drains on employee resources.

Harvey Nichols also has a policy to completely restrict access to peer-to-peer sites, which are commonly used for downloading copyrighted music and video. Such activity can consume essential bandwidth needed for business-critical applications as well as pose legal liability and corporate confidentiality issues.

“Our corporate Internet access policy is designed to maximise employee productivity and minimise corporate risk to legal liability issues,” says Smith. “With Websense Web Security it’s simple to set different access policies for different user groups according to their needs. For example, the marketing department currently is allowed access to Web 2.0 applications including social networking sites which are used for corporate marketing purposes, while our general Internet users are not. While the company is exploring the benefits of Web 2.0 technologies, we have the ability to stay protected.”

The Results

Harvey Nichols is now confident that they have the best protection possible with Websense Web Security and Hosted Email Security.

“Websense Hosted Email Security has virtually eliminated spam and, as a hosted solution, is simple to implement with nothing to install on-site,” says Smith. “This saves us time and reduces the cost of managing email based threats while providing us with the highest protection.”

Compliance

“A key benefit of Websense Web Security is the confidence it gives us that employees are using the Internet appropriately, are not being exposed to risks, and are completely protected,” says Smith. “This is good for our users and the company.”

Flexibility

“Websense allows a granularity of detail in setting policies that we never had before,” says Smith. “It’s simple to categorise Internet users into different groups allocating them unique Web access rights dependent upon their job roles and access needs. If we wanted we could even put quotas on how much time users are allocated each day.”

Looking forward with one trusted supplier

“Since implementing Websense Web Security and Hosted Email Security we are confident our network is protected from external threats. We are also able to enforce corporate Web and email policy easily and effectively,” concludes Smith.

“We can completely depend on the security solutions from Websense. The ability to get comprehensive security protection from one trusted supplier is a definite bonus.”

Click here for free evaluations of Websense solutions.