Case Study: Large State University strengthens campus security and segmentation with Guardicore

State University Selects Guardicore to Protect Critical Building Operating Technology Across 24 Campuses

Large State University, a public institution serving more than 100,000 students across 24 campuses, needed to securely centralize its building automation systems as part of a statewide smart campus initiative. The university was concerned about weak segmentation between OT and IT environments, the risk of lateral movement across its 600+ buildings, and the lack of data from campuses that were operating as standalone systems. To address these challenges, it evaluated Guardicore and its Centra security platform with micro-segmentation capabilities.

Guardicore implemented centralized visibility, segmentation policies, and threat detection and response to control east-west traffic and isolate applications and building systems from one another. The university was able to quickly create policies, block unwanted communication between vendors, and uncover operational anomalies such as an unexpected print spooler connection caused by an abandoned remote desktop session. With Guardicore, Large State University improved security, simplified policy management, and gained the monitoring needed to support future automation and energy-saving initiatives across its campuses.