Tesco standardises security systems

Tesco has standardised its security onto a single supplier's systems, to make remote management easier and cut risks to its data.

The supermarket chain worked with its IT services provider Wipro to replace a range of legacy applications with Fortinet's FortiGate systems in its Hindustan Services Centre, from where the company runs its global IT.

Some 3,200 Tesco stores in the UK, US, Japan, China, Ireland, Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Slovakia, Turkey, Malaysia, South Korea and Thailand are affected by the change.

The company is using Fortinet FortiGate 1000 and 500 security systems for firewall, intrusion prevention, antivirus, anti-spam and web content filtering. It is also using FortiAnalyzer software to log and analyse security event data, and FortiManager software for central management.

Tesco said it needed to replace the multiple legacy systems because they had become difficult to manage and were risking the security of data.

Sridhar Rathnam, IT services director at Tesco HSC, explained that the "complexity of managing these multiple point products created a strain on IT resources".

Tesco required its security, monitoring and management systems to be "tightly integrated", he said, "so that we could easily configure our security systems remotely and also drill-down for more details about security incidents when they occur".

Feedback on security needed to be "accurate, timely and detailed", he said.

The Hindustan Services Centre employs 2,600 people and designs, develops, tests, and manages Tesco's key IT applications. It also processes the payment of suppliers.

In May, a remote "routine IT upgrade" stopped tills from working at 100 of Tesco's UK stores. A number of stores were temporarily shut as a result.