SchoolsBroadband

Evening Steve, I'm sorry you feel that way. I got in touch and asked by PM so I could get a NOC engineer who has a lot more knowledge than I do (as they dealt with the issue technically and I didn't as i'm not as technical as they are) to discuss. If we go into the tiny intricacies as to what we do at every action point along the way of an RFO or any issue then you'd have a very very long piece of documentation to read some of which probably isn't for public consumption as it would go into specifics of our solution design which could compromise the security of our platform. The RFO is a high level reason for the issue. At the moment we live in very odd times and network traffic utilisation isn't anywhere near what it normally is due to people not being at school at all so there connections aren't being used. We do not have easy to access statistics which shows how many schools are actually using our Internet connections (unless we go through each graph per connection individually or write some new code to produce the stats). if it was in normal time and we saw a drop in network traffic by 50% then it's likely 50% of our customers would be offline but at the moment that's not correct as many aren't in use. We believe the majority of customers were fixed because A) the number of calls into our call centre we had went down significantly and overall traffic throughput increased to near normal levels which would indicate most customers were back online. Also we had cases open and closed each individual one down in the afternoon. To be any more technical than that I'd need a NOC guy / gal to answer. I'm very sorry this affected you and others and that I can't be more concise as to your requests in a public forum. Again though, I'd be happy for one of the NOC engineers that personally dealt with the issue to give you a call to discuss as I would with any other customer also. I think i'll leave it at that. Have a good evening. Dave

hi @Steve21, to clarify when i sent the post I believe we had about 25 schools still affected. This was then whittled down over the afternoon until all cases were cleared and everyone was back online. We are unsure on the exact number of customers that were initially impacted in the early morning as it was very difficult to ascertain and the number one priority was to get people back online when we knew how the issue occurred. It wasn't everyone (as per discussion on this thread some people saying they were fine) but it was a number of customers. The majority of the initial batch of customers that were offline were back online by 10:26. if you need any more information or want a call to discuss please send me a PM. Thanks Dave

Yes we've a very embarrassed and sorry engineer. As are we. Dave

Evening all, We always try to get an rfo out within a week of any issue happening if not then we will send a holding communication. A week from the point of issue I believe is tomorrow so we are within our normal time parameters which is defined in our service handbook. A draft of the comms has already been sent from our noc team to our operations team at the end of last week. If we can give it to those affected then we will send just to them. If we can't or it's too difficult / takes too long to accurately identify those affected then we will send it to everyone or a larger sub set of customers. The comms will be sent out shortly. Thanks Dave

I would never suggesting doing that no. But some schools do.

@Mavc isnt quite right. He is correct if you want to do https decryption but if not then most transparent firewalls should do this if they come with content filtering. Our hosted netsweeper platform does this out of the box. Dave

Evening @caffrey. No known issues at all today and we haven't had any reports from anyone to my knowledge. Thanks Dave

Hi @Edu-IT an rfo for those affected customers will be sent out shortly. Dave

Hi folks, we had an issue affecting about 25 customers. I don't have any more information than that at the moment but will pass on once I've an update from the NOC team. Sorry for the inconvenience caused. David

Hi everyone, FYI we delivered this to over 1,000 disadvantaged pupils last week. We also now have an unlimited data option as well as increased data usage limits for other packages. Prices start from only £10 for 12GIG including filtering. See http://www.edugeek.net/forums/cloud-services/214986-4g-connectivity-including-cloud-based-filtering-security.html and https://www.schoolsbroadband.co.uk/mobilebroadband We can also pre-configure all of the dongles / mi-fi devices so you don't have to manually setup them up. They are literally just plug and play. PM me if anyone is interested. Thanks Dave

hi @the_quick we certainly do. I'll send you a PM. Thanks Dave

@ITGURU we can. I'll send you a PM

Hi @edut-it, we put in a holding update. We are still working with Netsweeper and although we both believe we know where the issue is we do not yet have the full definitive answer that we agree on. As soon as we do we will update everyone. What I can say is that the issue will not happen again as we know how to mitigate it. My apologies if this sounds slightly cryptic but without writing pages of information to explain what's happened in full and what both parties have discovered it's difficult to explain. What i will say is please watch this space as we've not "pushed this under the carpet" Thanks Dave

Hello everyone, as you may or may not know we have launched our own 4G service which includes our network level content filtering and security services as standard. This allows pupils and staff to work via 4G from home through either a USB dongle, mi-fi or direct onboard sim connection and gives them the same filtering at home as they would get in school. Some details can be found here https://www.schoolsbroadband.co.uk/mobilebroadband We've seen a huge demand for this and have connected about 1,000 sim cards live in the first week of product launch, one solution which was 600 sims for a large MAT. Everything is pre-configured. Just plug in and go. Highlight features included as standard are user reporting SSL decryption Prevent compliant time, IP, group and user based policies Usage from pay as you go to unlimited per sim / connection Ability to put on a real world IP address rather than carrier grade NAT Bundle prices start from as little as £9pm for 12GIG of data and contracts can be on rolling 30 day terms. Other use case scenario's which also apply are 4G Backup and auto failover should your primary connection go down Rapid site deployment Please send me a PM if interested or fill in the contact form on the web page above.

Morning all, I received the link below this morning via email. I highly suggest anyone with a Sophos XG firewall follows Sophos's advice. http://app.go.sophos.com/e/er?s=1777052651&lid=15561&elqTrackId=739249abcf3a4321852c8b6d925cab96&elq=410ad22f4f564d94b224e5c19fe64b8f&elqaid=12444&elqat=1 Dave

Hello again everyone. As of next week we have a new unlimited data tariff which includes our netsweeper filtering / reporting and Fortigate firewall security solution. You can use your own hardware, purchase dongles /mifi through us or put directly into an LTE capable device such as an iPad or chromebook. Send me a pm if interested. Thanks Dave

Fortigates are in our opinion the best you can get. They're not the cheapest but you get a lot of functionality with them. We host numerous ones in our data centre and virtualise them so customers get their own VDOM and can manage them on their own rather than put boxes on site. Added value is that they can create a WAN easily as everything terminates in an individual VDOM so they can control site to site policies and apply UTM traffic profiles. All good stuff indeed. Dave

Pm'd ...

Hi @Edu-IT, for the moment for an individual user is 40GIG although I am working on some bigger bundles. You can use app control and filtering policies to help reduce data consumption if required. We can also do them on rolling 30 day contracts if required too. We're getting a lot of enquiries on this at the moment. Dave

Hi folks, we already do unfiltered sim cards on both O2 and Vodafone and have been doing for about 10 years. Regarding @simpsonj points on safeguarding, we are about imminently launch a filtered 4G / 5G service with via private APN so any data used on it goes via our hosted Netsweeper and Fortigate platforms. There's no installation on the end device (bar a certificate) or Wagent dependent on the end device type. SIMS are likely to appear as another virtual interface on the Fortigate platform so you can do different firewall policies as well as still do user based filtering policies that link into Active Directory etc. These sims can also be used for 4G / 5G backup for a schools main Internet connection. We've mi-fi devices and routers up and working already and we're just doing the final part to do the same using a Huawei dongle. If you're interested in beta testing for us then please let us know. You don't have to be a customer but if you are then you can use the same filtering policies you already have setup for your school(s). Thanks Dave

Just to carry on with this. We've seen a big demand for 2 Factor Authentication using FortiToken (see https://www.fortinet.com/products/identity-access-management/fortitoken-mobile.html) on top of the standard SSL VPN solution we deliver via our Fortigates. If you'd like to use 2 Factor Authentication to further secure your network then please do get in touch with me or the team on the normal numbers / emails. I think we've setup nearly 400 schools for SSL VPN in the past week! Thanks Dave

Hello everyone, whether using our service or another suppliers I thought I'd update you on what Virgin, BT Openreach and Talk Talk are currently doing as this could impact the provision of a new line for you. BT Openreach Are continuing BAU however there are two differences / scenarios to normal. 1. Has anyone in the premises been diagnosed with COVID-19, been asked to self-isolate, or has travelled to a Coronavirus high-risk are or country in the last 14 days? If so the engineer will contact a special hotline for further advice on how to proceed and to ensure the job is correctly reappointed by Communication Providers (the ISP), as and when appropriate. 2. Is anyone in the premises suffering from flu-like symptoms? The engineer will proceed with the job, but will undertake additional hygiene actions. This includes wiping surfaces, asking the end customer to remain in a different room (could be an issue if no DBS check done by Openreach on engineer depending on your schools policy), not accepting the offer of drinks and on finishing the job not completing the sign-off with the end customer If the answer to both questions is no then the job will proceed as normal. Virgin Installs are continuing as normal Talk Talk Have put a network freeze on. Circuits are still being installed (new and inflight) but changes regarding NNI moves / orders and some bandwidth upgrades are not being delivered until the network freeze is halted which is at Talk Talks discretion. This could mean that if an ISP was ordering a new NNI that this could be paused until the change freeze is removed which could affect circuit delivery if the circuit was to be delivered on the new NNI. So far we've only a handful of bandwidth upgrades (due to NNI moves) which have been affected and customers informed. All carriers keep us updated weekly and I'll pass on more information as we have it. Thanks Dave

@Primus, although we've had our issues we still have a lot of happy customers and they haven't been affected by the issues you've mentioned. If everyone was so unhappy we wouldn't have a business as everyone would have left, which they haven't. I've already had two enquiries via Edugeek today before i posted on this thread.... Dave

Hi @sippo, we do everything in the cloud. Happy to give you a quote if you would care to send me a PM? Thanks Dave

Hardware router with ipsec. Checkout something like a draytek or a fortinet device to do the job as they're easy to use and rock solid. Dave