Softcat Limited

Akamai Bot Management and protection

Built on the Akamai Intelligent Platform™ and Akamai’s AnswerX™ carrier-grade recursive DNS, Akamai's Protective DNS Service, Enterprise Threat Protector (ETP) proactively identifies and blocks targeted threats such as malware, ransomware, DNS data exfiltration, and phishing. Unified security and acceptable use polices can be enforced in minutes for all employees.

Features

• Threat-Intelligence based on Akamai’s visibility into 15–30% of daily web-traffic

Benefits

• Enforce acceptable Internet use policy effectively and consistently

£1.50 a unit

• Education pricing available
• Free trial available

Service documents

• Pricing document

  PDF

• Service definition document

  PDF

• Terms and conditions

  PDF

Request an accessible format

If you use assistive technology (such as a screen reader) and need versions of these documents in a more accessible format, email the supplier at psitq@softcat.com. Tell them what format you need. It will help if you say what assistive technology you use.

Framework

G-Cloud 14

Service ID

115877821239105

Contact

Charles Harrison
01628 403403
psitq@softcat.com

Service scope

• Software add-on or extension: No
• Cloud deployment model:
  • Public cloud
  • Private cloud
  • Community cloud
  • Hybrid cloud
• Service constraints: Available on Request
• System requirements: Available on Request

User support

• Email or online ticketing support: Email or online ticketing
• Support response times: Support coverage is 24/7. Response time varies according to the severity of the incident.
• User can manage status and priority of support tickets: No
• Phone support: Yes
• Phone support availability: 24 hours, 7 days a week
• Web chat support: No
• Onsite support: Yes, at extra cost
• Support levels: Standard Support is included with all Services at no cost. Named Enhanced Support includes all of Standard Support plus dedicated support engineer for proactive support, faster response SLA's, live support 24/7, unlimited support request, two training courses. Technical Advisory Support services are a designated technical account manager during business hours, it provides pre- and post-sales technical consultation, assistance with strategic initiatives through ongoing engagement, scheduled periodic status meetings, conducting periodic Engagement Reviews, sharing of industry and technology best practices with Customers.
• Support available to third parties: Yes

Onboarding and offboarding

• Getting started: We provide fully managed integration of the service which includes a knowledge transfer of the basics. We also offer full portal administration training and have formal training courses that customers can attend. We also provide custom onsite training for customers if required. Self service training is also available via the management portal. We also provide a community where customers can ask questions and provide tips and tricks.
• Service documentation: Yes
• Documentation formats: HTML
• End-of-contract data extraction: SIEM, Reports, CSV, Syslog
• End-of-contract process: Customer access to the service portal is de-provisioned, and the service ceases to perform. There are no costs associated with contract ending, unless the customer chooses to renew.

Using the service

• Web browser interface: Yes
• Supported browsers:
  • Internet Explorer 11
  • Microsoft Edge
  • Firefox
  • Chrome
  • Safari
  • Opera
• Application to install: No
• Designed for use on mobile devices: No
• Service interface: Yes
• User support accessibility: None or don’t know
• Description of service interface: The interface permits management of the deployment, reporting and metrics on usage and blocking, and analysis of blocked domains including details on why the domain was blocked
• Accessibility standards: None or don’t know
• Description of accessibility: The interface has been designed to modern web standards but no specific accessibility assessment has been made.
• Accessibility testing: The interface has been designed to modern web standards but no specific accessibility assessment has been made.
• API: Yes
• What users can and can't do using the API: Every configuration and report can be managed or retrieved through Akamai's RESTful API called OPEN.
• API documentation: Yes
• API documentation formats:
  • HTML
  • PDF
• API sandbox or test environment: Yes
• Customisation available: Yes
• Description of customisation: Administrators can customize which locations they can use, which security constraints they want to set, and which policies they want the users to abide by

Scaling

• Independence of resources: As a leading provider of Cloud-based services, Akamai has developed a robust delivery architecture that both scales with each customer's capacity needs, but also isolates customers from impacting others. With ETP we maintain proper "headroom" on the recursive DNS architecture at both a regional and global level. This enables Akamai to adapt to changing traffic usage patterns, attacks, and even spike events due to a customer marketing event (for instance). Some refer to this as elastic capacity. In addition, Akamai's service portal LUNA enables customers to manage their security policies independently of other customers.

Analytics

• Service usage metrics: Yes
• Metrics types: Akamai provides a Service Level Agreement in which we warrant the service will have 100% Availalbity
• Reporting types:
  • Real-time dashboards
  • Reports on request

Resellers

• Supplier type: Reseller (no extras)
• Organisation whose services are being resold: Akamai

Staff security

• Staff security clearance: Other security clearance
• Government security clearance: Up to Developed Vetting (DV)

Asset protection

• Knowledge of data storage and processing locations: Yes
• Data storage and processing locations:
  • United Kingdom
  • European Economic Area (EEA)
• User control over data storage and processing locations: No
• Datacentre security standards: Supplier-defined controls
• Penetration testing frequency: At least every 6 months
• Penetration testing approach: Another external penetration testing organisation
• Protecting data at rest: Other
• Other data at rest protection approach: Akamai acts as a conduit between customers infrastructure and end-users and doesn’t store data that customers haven't selected to be cached. Data selected by the customer is cached to be shared between end-users that ask for the same information. As such, it is not considered as “secret"" and is not encrypted at rest.; ; Akamai's corporate and production networks are fully separated, Akamai employees don't have access to cached customer data. To access the production environment, Akamai employees must receive a grant from our proprietary access-control system. Grants are time-limited and all requests are reviewed quarterly for consistency and accuracy.
• Data sanitisation process: Yes
• Data sanitisation type: Explicit overwriting of storage before reallocation
• Equipment disposal approach: A third-party destruction service

Data importing and exporting

• Data export approach: SIEM, Reports, CSV, Syslog
• Data export formats:
  • CSV
  • Other
• Other data export formats:
  • SIEM
  • Syslog
  • Reports
• Data import formats: CSV

Data-in-transit protection

• Data protection between buyer and supplier networks: TLS (version 1.2 or above)
• Data protection within supplier network: TLS (version 1.2 or above)

Availability and resilience

• Guaranteed availability: Service Levels and Credits - Akamai agrees to provide a level of service demonstrating: (a) 100% Uptime: Every client request through the ETP service will be directed to a live Customer server 100% of the time. (b) Credits: If the ETP service fails to meet the above service level, the Customer will receive (as its sole remedy) a credit equal to fees for the day in which the failure occurs II. The following methodology will be employed to measure ETP service availability: Agents and Polling Frequency (a) Customer may perform a service availability test by performing DNS lookups from at least five (5) geographically and network-diverse locations in major metropolitan areas. Details of the availability testing and methodology can be supplied to customers on request.
• Approach to resilience: We operate over 250,000 servers globally - all of which act as part of our platform. Our DNS platform always directs requests to servers that are available and not under high load. Due to the wide scale of the platform, there is significant overcapacity to allow for peak usage.
• Outage reporting: Akamai will send notifications via the Luna Portal, Akamai Community, email and/or any other pre-established channels of communication for Service Outages that affect G10.

Identity and authentication

• User authentication needed: No
• Access restrictions in management interfaces and support channels: Administrative access to the Luna platform will restrict access to management portal
• Access restriction testing frequency: At least every 6 months
• Management access authentication:
  • 2-factor authentication
  • Public key authentication (including by TLS client certificate)
  • Identity federation with existing provider (for example Google Apps)
  • Username or password

Audit information for users

• Access to user activity audit information: Users have access to real-time audit information
• How long user audit data is stored for: Less than 1 month
• Access to supplier activity audit information: Users contact the support team to get audit information
• How long supplier audit data is stored for: At least 12 months
• How long system logs are stored for: Between 1 month and 6 months

Standards and certifications

• ISO/IEC 27001 certification: No
• ISO 28000:2007 certification: No
• CSA STAR certification: No
• PCI certification: Yes
• Who accredited the PCI DSS certification: Specialized Security Systems Inc
• PCI DSS accreditation date: 30/06/2021
• What the PCI DSS doesn’t cover: Akamai’s Attestation of Compliance with the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS) version 3.2.1: https://www.akamai.com/site/en/documents/akamai/pci-dss-3.2-attestation-of-compliance.pdf Customers are instructed that only products running on the Secure Content Delivery Network, and Enterprise Application Access are in-scope for PCI and that no other systems are intended or should be used for the transmission, processing, or storage of cardholder data. Nevertheless, Akamai's products and services running on the Secure Content Delivery Network, and Enterprise Application Access may be configured to be used by customers in their cardholder data environment, and may be included in the scope of customers' PCI assessments.
• Cyber essentials: No
• Cyber essentials plus: No
• Other security certifications: Yes
• Any other security certifications:
  • PCI DSS
  • HIPAA
  • FedRAMP
  • Service Organisation Control 2 Type II
  • ISO27002

Security governance

• Named board-level person responsible for service security: Yes
• Security governance certified: Yes
• Security governance standards: Other
• Other security governance standards: PCI DSS; HIPAA; FedRAMP; SOC 2 Type II; ISO27002
• Information security policies and processes: The Akamai information security program has established procedures in security testing, software security and deployment of policy and guidance, metrics reporting, change control, incident management, physical security and event monitoring and other activities. Through cooperative efforts within Akamai, security practices are maintained via effective access control mechanisms, thorough network and software architecture design review, strict access controls, pervasive use of authentication and encryption protocols, and employee and contractor background investigations. Formal, scheduled, pro-active reviews of information security practices are conducted through internal assessments and evaluations conducted by Information Security, Engineering, Development, Operations and Executive Leadership. In addition, information security oversight and evaluation is conducted through internal and external audits as well as and post-event analysis. Operational security practices are established and appear pervasive throughout all entities managing the production network.

Operational security

• Configuration and change management standard: Supplier-defined controls
• Configuration and change management approach: The change management process for software changes is chaired by the Director of Operations and the Release Manager. The process reviews all changes and potential customer impact. Any releases are signed off on by appropriate parties, which always include the SVP of Engineering and SVP of Delivery.; ; To minimize the risk of the corruption of information systems and the accidental removal of security controls a formal change control procedure must be followed when making changes to any production system.; ; Changes in the CDN are implemented in phases, to observe impact and prevent interruptions.
• Vulnerability management type: Supplier-defined controls
• Vulnerability management approach: The vulnerability management process is set forth to ensure timely deployment of security patches and remediation of vulnerabilities to maintain confidentiality, integrity, and availability of Akamai systems and applications. The lifecycle of the vulnerability management includes tasks such as: investigate new vulnerabilities, remediate vulnerabilities, and close out the records when applicable. If the vulnerability is impacting to Akamai, the Information Security team is responsible for shepherding the vulnerability through all of the stages, ending in the closure stage. Please see this post for more information:; https://blogs.akamai.com/2016/08/vulnerability-management-at-akamai.html
• Protective monitoring type: Supplier-defined controls
• Protective monitoring approach: New vulnerabilities are identified and tracked. Vulnerabilities are identified by: Receiving vendor and security researcher vulnerability announcements, Monitoring vendor reporting distribution lists and reporting forums, monitoring public reporting forums (CERT, Bugtraq, SANS, etc) These Subscriptions help identify vulnerabilities that might impact Akamai information systems and networks. Additionally, the Information Security teams analyse Akamai's software and architecture to identify potential vulnerabilities. Once a specific vulnerability is identified, it is assigned to an Information Security and a subject matter expert to remedy. Vulnerabilities that do not impact Akamai are marked as such and closed.
• Incident management type: Supplier-defined controls
• Incident management approach: Akamai operates a documented Technical Crisis and Incident Management Process, this document can be shared with customers. Akamai has designed its technical systems and human operations with many safety controls and sensors to help prevent and detect issues in our environment as they arise. If a customer-identified issue cannot be solved by Akamai Support then an incident is declared. For all severity levels, we have an Incident Manager role identified to evaluate the severity of a situation and coordinate with others working on the problem. A Service Incident Report is produced identifying failures and highlighting changes to prevent reoccurrence.

Secure development

• Approach to secure software development best practice: Conforms to a recognised standard, but self-assessed

Public sector networks

• Connection to public sector networks: No

Social Value

• Social Value:

  Social Value

  • Fighting climate change
  • Tackling economic inequality
  • Equal opportunity
  • Wellbeing

  Fighting climate change

  Softcat are dedicated to reducing our environmental impact and actively promoting sustainability. Our commitment to sustainability is a core aspect of our business strategy, driving us to innovate and lead in the creation of a more sustainable future for our company and the communities we serve. This commitment is embedded in our policies, operating procedures, and training programs.; ; We are proud to be the first FTSE 250 company to be awarded 5-star status in relation to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. ; ; We aim to achieve a Carbon Net-Zero Value Circle by 2040 by prioritising renewable energy, reducing natural resource use, minimising waste, and safeguarding biodiversity in compliance with environmental legislation.; ; At Softcat, we have taken significant steps towards securing renewable energy across our organisation, reducing our scope 1 & 2 emissions. We had the target of using 100% Renewable Energy across all our locations by 2024. We successfully delivered against this target ~2 years early.; ; In May 2023 we took delivery of 15 electric vehicles, replacing all existing fossil-fuelled company cars used by employees for business means. The implementation of the EV pool fleet will see a saving of over 80 tons of CO2e per year. A huge impact on our Net Zero targets.

  Tackling economic inequality

  As a value-add reseller, Softcat outsources the products, services, and solutions through our extensive network of partners, to best suit the needs of our broad client base. We always consider and promote SMEs and local providers where appropriate, particularly for the products and services we offer via the G Cloud framework.; ; We remain dedicated to improving employability and educational awareness across schools, colleges, and universities to help break down the barriers to joining technology organisations.; ; We work collaboratively with many schools that are close in proximity to our offices, to ensure we are actively supporting the community as well as schools from lower socio-economic backgrounds. ; ; We visit the schools to talk about the IT sector and the roles in our organisation, as well as promoting work-experience opportunities during the summer. In particular, we actively encourage students from diverse backgrounds to engage in work experience to appreciate the roles available in our sector.; ; For ambitious school and college leavers, a Softcat Apprenticeship is a great first step into the world of work, with 94% of our apprentices offered a permanent position at Softcat post apprenticeships, which goes to show the amazing opportunity available with us.; ; We were ranked 1st in IT & Consultancy, and 10th overall in by RateMyApprenticeship.com - Best 100 Apprenticeship Employers 2023-2024 list.; ; Softcat now also offer 12 month paid internships to University students looking to complete a year in industry as part of their undergraduate studies.

  Equal opportunity

  Our approach to diversity and inclusion is introduced first during our induction training, as part of our Softcat values, outlining responsibility to uphold our principles. This message is reinforced by our process and policies, networks, Allyship Training and Inclusion Awareness campaigns.; ; Softcat supports diversity and inclusion through various networks including:; - Supporting Women in Business (SWIB); - The Ethnic and Cultural Network; - The Pride Network; - The Family Network; - The Empowering Disability and Neurodiversity Network (EDN); - The Faith at Work Network; - Armed Forces & Veterans Network; These networks aim to create a supportive and inclusive work environment for all employees, regardless of gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, disability, or family commitments.; ; Our allyship programme, Stronger Together, is a mixture of event and workshop-based training available to all staff. Programme topics include, bias, power, privilege, and being a greater ally. ; ; Inclusion Awareness campaigns include race, disability, sexual orientation, gender, faith, and caring responsibilities. These sessions highlight and celebrate minority groups, through panel sessions, Q&A sessions and training, providing an opportunity to discuss and understand ways to be more inclusive. ; ; Our efforts to improve diversity and inclusion have been incredibly successful. Since 2020, the number of female employees below management level has increased to 35%, and the number of ethnic minority employees rose to 17%.

  Wellbeing

  At Softcat, all employees are provided with access to our multidimensional wellbeing programme which includes flexible work arrangements, free nutritious breakfast, mental health support, employee benefits scheme, health and wellbeing week activities, and online workshops.; ; Giving back to the community is an innate part of who we are as a company. All Softcat employees are therefore given two volunteer days per year to support a charitable or community cause. ; ; Each of our 10 regional offices also support local charities through fundraising, donations and events. For example, our Manchester office has raised over £30,000 for the WeLoveMCR charity. This funding has supported young, disadvantaged Manchester citizens in gaining qualifications to broaden their work opportunities and supporting local groups in delivering indispensable services that enable community cohesion.

Pricing

• Price: £1.50 a unit
• Discount for educational organisations: Yes
• Free trial available: Yes
• Description of free trial: A full version of the service is available for a 60day period

Service documents

• Pricing document

  PDF

• Service definition document

  PDF

• Terms and conditions

  PDF

Request an accessible format

If you use assistive technology (such as a screen reader) and need versions of these documents in a more accessible format, email the supplier at psitq@softcat.com. Tell them what format you need. It will help if you say what assistive technology you use.