Schmallenberg Eslohe pastoral network relies on Securepoint security
The Schmallenberg Eslohe pastoral network relies on Systemhaus Sauerland and the German manufacturer of firewall systems, Securepoint GmbH, to connect the individual parish offices. The parish offices are connected to the head office and the VoIP telephone system from the German manufacturer STARFACE in Karlsruhe is linked via a secure VPN connection. This was realised via an RC200 in the head office, with fully equipped UTM features and the Black Dwarfs, as pure VPN gateways in the branch offices.
Virtual parish offices and VoIP telephony
Additional dial-in functionality is provided by a terminal server at the head office. If required, the system also integrates volunteers who can connect to the pastoral network from home using their own devices. Other general objectives for networking the parish offices are high system availability and a high level of security.
The pastoral association commissioned Systemhaus Sauerland to set up the virtual parish office, which began installing the Securepoint systems at the end of 2014 and gradually connected the individual branch offices.
In addition to the technical advantages of the NextGen UTM firewall (ease of use and high security standards), Marc Schauerte from Systemhaus Sauerland was particularly impressed by the good cooperation with the manufacturer, whose team clarified incoming service requests immediately. On completion of the project, the pastoral association expressed its complete satisfaction with the realised solution.
Now that the set-up phase has been completed, the pastoral association is using a total of 70 user licences, with regular updates, to network the parish offices. The VoIP infrastructure consists of Securepoint devices, which are responsible for the secure network functionality, a STARFACE VoIP telephone system as well as Gigaset DECT telephones with VoIP connection and other wired end devices. A Dell PowerEdge system is used as the server. The VoIP telephony provider is Sipgate.
Automatic bandwidth management of the UTM firewall
The automatic bandwidth management of the UTM firewall from version 11.6 has proven to be particularly advantageous when sharing the same network connections for all services, including VoIP. The transmission of calls via VoIP places higher demands on network resources, especially in terms of latency, than other Internet services such as file transfers or e-mail. The available resources can be specifically adapted to the requirements of the individual services with bandwidth management. However, manually configuring an optimal allocation requires specialist knowledge and is comparatively time-consuming. The automatic bandwidth management of the Securepoint UTM relieves system administrators of this effort for setting up and maintaining the QoS rules. This solution therefore enables high voice quality with low installation costs by utilising a shared data connection for VoIP telephone calls and all other services.
IT security solution and specialised trade partner
Systemhaus Sauerland UG (haftungsbechränkt) & Co. KG
In der Eitmecke 2a
57392 Schmallenberg
Phone: 02975/9639820
Mail: info@systemhaus-sauerland.de
Web: www.systemhaus-sauerland.de