From Puck Stops to Cyber Stops: WatchGuard Safeguards the Seattle Kraken

One of the more recent expansion teams in the NHL, the Seattle Kraken, had a season the fans admittedly would like to forget. Missing the playoffs, the Kraken are in the midst of finding a new head coach to come in and steer the team in the right direction in future seasons.

Off the ice, the Kraken have a six-person IT team that is responsible for managing and protecting more than 260 individuals and their devices at home and on the road, as well as servers, private networks and other equipment. The Kraken Community Iceplex, which houses the team’s offices and IT equipment, also has rinks and a Wi-Fi network that are open to the public.

With that said, managing all of that is not an easy task. A unified platform would greatly assist the six-person team in detecting any anomalies within the network. That is why the Kraken turned to WatchGuard Technologies to deploy its Unified Security Platform architecture.

WatchGuard is trusted by more than 17,000 security resellers and service providers to protect more than 250,000 customers. The company’s products and services span network security and intelligence, advanced endpoint protection, MFA and secure Wi-Fi.

WatchGuard’s Unified Security Platform approach is uniquely designed for MSPs to deliver security that increases their business scale and velocity while also improving operational efficiency.

The Kraken organization now relies on WatchGuard to provide firewalls, endpoint protection, antivirus, advanced threat detection and response across all environments, and device and patch management, all managed from a single console.

“Our goal is to make enterprise-class cybersecurity accessible to organizations of any size,” said Michelle Welch, Chief Marketing Officer and Senior Vice President of Business Strategy at WatchGuard. “A key part of that value proposition is the simplicity and ease of use our Unified Security Platform provides to IT security pros so they can efficiently stop threats faced by their organizations.”

The Kraken’s IT team supports technology innovation across the franchise. WatchGuard’s intuitive management – which is designed for ease of use – enables the Kraken’s IT team to quickly and efficiently recognize and address issues.

“We need strong, unified security to protect sensitive data and information,” said Sean Rawlins, Seattle Kraken's Director of IT. “What’s more, ensuring the security of fan data and online experiences is a top priority. With the cybersecurity landscape continuously evolving, WatchGuard enables us to maintain vigilance in monitoring for and defending against emerging threats.”