St Barbara: Stopping the enemies at the gate

The Challenge

St Barbara approached Datacom to assess its email security, after several attempts by malicious attackers to impersonate senior staff for financial fraud. Datacom carried out an assessment of the St Barbara security environment and determined that the existing email security platform was not performing as required, with various advanced threats, such as ‘phishing’ and ‘whaling’ attacks posing a significant business risk.

St Barbara needed a trusted partner with the cybersecurity expertise to find new approaches to their email security, and provide ongoing professional support and services.

The Datacom difference

Datacom has been St Barbara’s managed services partner since 2016, providing professional support and services, and is a trusted partner. Datacom was able to combine its long history of cybersecurity expertise with intimate knowledge of the customer’s business environment to produce a secure solution. One of the key recommendations was to implement Mimecast email security, and to create and enforce new security policies. The project started at St Barbara’s Melbourne head office and rolled out across the whole business with a tight four-week deadline.

Together Datacom and Mimecast presented an evidence-based strategy using Datacom’s Cyber Resilience Framework that allowed St Barbara to secure its systems both at the email and application layers. As well as eliminating the threat of email impersonation, this also enabled St Barbara’s IT systems to detect and counter spam and stop malware at the point of entry.

Results

The joint Datacom and Mimecast solution has helped St Barbara avoid any adverse financial impact from email-or cyber-attacks or viruses, and quickly decreased the risk of malicious attacks. Following the introduction of Mimecast email security, impersonation attempts have reduced by more than 90 per cent. This allows St Barbara staff to remain focused on core business rather than being distracted by fraudulent emails or spam. Moreover, the project was delivered on time and on budget, providing a seamless transition to the new platform with immediate effects. Staff now have additional confidence that their business is protected against future threats.