BT and NETSCOUT – Partnered for Success

Customer Profile

British Telecommunications plc (BT) is one of the world’s leading providers of communications services and solutions serving customers in 180 countries. Its principal activities include the provision of networked IT services globally; local, national and international telecommunications services to its customers for use at home, at work and on the move; broadband, TV and internet products and services; and converged fixed-mobile products and services. BT is also one of the world’s leading cybersecurity providers, delivering security solutions to consumers, governments and businesses, including some of the world’s best known brands. 

The Challenge

For BT, the security of their global network and services is critical to their customers’ businesses and their own business reputation. Due to a continuing increase in the frequency and complexity of DDoS attacks, gaining an understanding of the current threat landscape is becoming elusive and keeping up with the bad guys is challenging. As a Tier 1 service provider, BT has two principle objectives in its DDoS defense program: protection of BT networks, services and infrastructure; plus, protection of the networks, services and businesses of BT customers. To meet these objectives, the BT team recognized the need to augment their internal security expertise with additional resources and capabilities that allowed them to expand the company’s use of the Arbor solution throughout their core infrastructure and business-critical systems. 

Understanding the core business, external customer offerings, and the strategic direction of the organization – coupled with a deep knowledge of the threat landscape – are all critical to implementing and delivering a successful DDoS protection service. 

Solution in Action

To address its cybersecurity needs, BT turned to NETSCOUT’s resident engineer program. A dedicated DDoS expert from NETSCOUT has been fully integrated into the cybersecurity team at BT, working collaboratively and cross-functionally between network & security design, deployment and operational teams. The resident engineer enables a better translation of product capability into use-cases that deliver value to the BT team.

“For BT, the resident engineer program has been a very successful two-way partnership that delivers real value to our company; one that pays us back four-fold,” explained Ronnie Miller, GM, Global Commercial Cyber Operations for BT. “The NETSCOUT engineer’s commitment, dedication and understanding of our infrastructure, our strategy, and how we productize and deliver services, is invaluable. Because he’s incorporated into our team, we’re able to respond to an incident immediately. The bottom line is, when one of our customers comes under attack, we’re exposed as well. The resident engineer helps us avoid the cost and reputational damage from a prolonged DDoS attack.” 

The resident engineer’s understanding of the latest attack vectors, and how Arbor technology can provide the visibility and mitigation capabilities needed to protect against them, is immensely valuable to the BT team. Over a relatively short time, the resident engineer developed an intimate understanding of BT’s systems and personnel and was able to act as an integral part of the BT team when resolving real- time DDoS protection issues.

The NETSCOUT resident engineer works as an extension to BT’s security engineering teams, deployed across the UK, and beyond. Access to the latest best-practice information helps to inform wider strategic security programs, as well as providing timely bulletins and advisories to BT and their customers on new threats. Access to training resources and war-games capabilities has further enhanced the partnership with the BT team. All of the above come together to help BT deliver the most efficient and timely response to any DDoS attack.

The Results

The NETSCOUT resident engineer program continues to be a success for BT with the same engineer now serving on-site with the company for more than seven years. The engineer has helped BT leverage the latest features and capabilities delivered through the Arbor solutions, with specifically tailored configurations to meet the unique protection needs of BT systems and those of their customers. 

BT’s expertise is enhanced through the resident engineer program to deliver in the heat of an attack. Preparation leveraging the very best technologies, processes and people are all critical components helping BT and NETSCOUT deliver world-class DDoS protection.