CenturyLink awarded DHS EINSTEIN 3 Accelerated service expansion contract

CenturyLink, Inc. of Monroe, LA announced on December 7 that it was recently awarded a service expansion  contract from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to provide EINSTEIN 3 Accelerated (E³A) protections to U.S. federal civilian agencies that cannot access E³A services through their existing Internet service provider.

CenturyLink was previously awarded a contract to provide EINSTEIN cybersecurity protections to the company’s customers in March 2013.

Through E³A, CenturyLink has been offering web Domain Name System protections, advanced email filtering and signature-based intrusion prevention security services to federal civilian agencies that receive their Internet service through CenturyLink.

This service expansion contract allows CenturyLink to offer E³A services to departments and agencies that receive their Internet service from other providers that aren’t able to deploy these critical cybersecurity protections.

The new contract helps DHS strengthen America’s defense against growing cyber threats and meet the objectives outlined by U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson to make E³A protections available to all federal civilian agencies by the end of 2015.

DHS’s EINSTEIN program uses network traffic patterns indicating known or suspected malicious cyber activity to help participating federal agencies protect their IT systems.

EINSTEIN capabilities are provided through a combination of commercial off-the-shelf hardware and software, government-developed software, and commercially available managed security services that are enhanced by DHS-provided information.

“CenturyLink is excited to be able to offer EINSTEIN cybersecurity protections to more federal agencies,” said CenturyLink Senior Vice President and General Manager Tim Meehan, who leads the company’s federal government team. “CenturyLink’s E³A service was the first to achieve initial operating capability from DHS and the first fully operational E³A system to begin actively providing cybersecurity services to federal civilian agencies’ end-users.”

CenturyLink is also a fully approved commercial services provider under the DHS Enhanced Cybersecurity Services (ECS) program, which helps U.S.-based companies protect their IT systems from unauthorized access, exploitation and data exfiltration.

Source: CenturyLink