Network solution implementation and design

¶ … Insurance Company

Information Technology

The CoverAll Insurance Company needs to transition from a wired network architecture to a wireless one, and despite their eight floor office building being refurbished ten years ago to have CAT-5 Ethernet cabling integrated throughout its walls, offices and conference rooms. Since then the company has found that equipping sales people, claims adjusters, and investigators with laptops has increased their productivity by allowing them to be more mobile, going between conference rooms in meeting with each other and with customers. With 800 employees in CoverAll Insurance Company, the speed of the wired network based on CAT-5 Ethernet cabling at 10 Mbits/second is constrained from both a speed and availability standpoint. The reliance on RJ-45 connections is greatly constraining the ability of employees to be mobile enough throughout the building to meet together and stay connected to share files, collaborating with each other and with customers. What needs to happen is first an overview of WiFi and wireless technologies followed by specific for networking hardware and software including security considerations. Next the recommended products for creating a secured wireless network are presented followed by an assessment of which carriers the CoverAll Insurance Company needs to consider partnering with for connectivity to the Internet.

Wireless Technology Overview

Beginning with access techniques for wireless computing networks, the reliance on four dominant multiplexing standards forms the foundation of wireless computing platforms need to form the foundation of CoverAll's Insurance Company. These include code-division multiplexing (CDM), frequency-division multiplexing (FDM), space-division multiplexing (SDM) and time-division multiplexing (TDM). These four approaches to managing access are specifically designed to ensure wireless networks can be configured to take into account differences in code, frequency, time and spatial differences (Swale, Fontenoy, 154, 155) and keep the wireless secure while also increasing the speed of the company's existing Internet by ten times, from 10 Bits/second to 100 Mbits/second.

CoverAll Insurance Company needs to budget to support multiple multiplexing standards within wireless networks is to allow for multiple users sharing same wireless router signal channels across a common available frequency spectrum (Borri, Casoni, Merani, 174, 175). In conjunction with the use of time division multiplexing techniques is the reliance on collision avoidance (CA) and collision detection (CD) approaches to managing time-division-based multiple access across a wireless network. The concepts of Carrier Sense Multiple Access/Collision Avoidance (CSMA/CA) and Carrier Sense Multiple Access/Collision Detection (CSMA/CD), originally defined as part of the Open Systems Interconnect Model (OSI Model) and later supported extensively throughout TCP/IP are critical for ensuring a secured WiFi site (Potter, 14, 15).

WiFi-based networks also rely extensively on frequency spectrum considerations and systems architectures to ensure there is a consistent level of wireless network performance and security (Swale, Fontenoy, 154, 155).

The third aspect of wireless computing today is the role of system architectures. Frequency spectrums are taken in conjunction with architectures to define relative levels of security for wireless networks (Potter, 14, 15). Many wireless architectures support ad hoc, cellular, and infrastructure architectures. Of these three the most secure is considered to be infrastructure due to the ability to define encryption levels and also delineate IPSEC-based security levels of the IP address level as to which specific WiFi-enabled device is provided connectivity access to the network (Obanaik, Jacob, Ananda, 2225) and (Potter, 14, 15). Of these three approaches ad-hoc is considered the most adaptable to roaming users and therefore shows the greatest opportunity to support contextual-based use of wireless networks while securing them from unintended use.

Recommended Hardware and Software

First, the existing CAT-5 Ethernet cabling can support up to 100 Mbytes/second and the server that acts as the company's gateway to the Internet needs to be updated with a new 10/100 switch to deliver a consistent 100 Mbits/second transfer rate on the existing CAT 5 cabling already installed. It is recommended that CoverAll Insurance Company purchase the Cisco WS-C2950-24 for $350 to increase the speed of its existing network. Depending on the number of connections to the Internet, there would need to be one of these Cisco Switches at each inbound Internet location in the company. It is assumed that there is a single Internet connection that CoverAll Insurance Company relies on today. The following table provides the specifications of the Cisco WS-C2950-24.

CISCO WS-C2950-24 SPECIFICATIONS

Product Description

Cisco Catalyst 2950-24 - switch - 24 ports

Device Type

Switch - stackable

Form Factor

External - 1U

Dimensions (WxDxH)

17.5 in x 9.5 in x 1.7 in Weight

6.6 lbs

RAM

16 MB SDRAM

Flash Memory

MB

Ports Qty

24 x Ethernet 10 Base-T, Ethernet 100 Base-TX

Data Transfer Rate

100 Mbps

Data Link Protocol

Ethernet, Fast Ethernet

Remote Management Protocol

SNMP, RMON, Telnet

Communication Mode

Half-duplex, full-duplex

Features

Network monitoring, full duplex capability, uplink, VLAN support, manageable, stackable

Compliant Standards

IEEE 802.3, IEEE 802.3u, IEEE 802.1D, IEEE 802.1Q, IEEE 802.1p, IEEE 802.3x, IEEE 802.1x

Power

AC 120/230 V AC 110/220 V ± 10% (50/60 Hz)

Manufacturer Warranty

Limited lifetime warranty

CISCO WS-C2950-24 NETWORKING

Ports Qty

24 x Ethernet 10 Base-T, Ethernet 100 Base-TX

Data Transfer Rate

100 Mbps

Data Link Protocol

Ethernet, Fast Ethernet

Remote Management Protocol

SNMP, RMON, Telnet

Connectivity Technology

Wired

Communication Mode

Half-duplex, full-duplex

Switching Protocol

Ethernet

MAC Address Table Size

8K entries

Status Indicators

Port status, link activity, collision status, port transmission speed, port duplex mode, bandwidth utilization %, power, link OK

Features

Network monitoring, full duplex capability, uplink, VLAN support, manageable, stackable

Compliant Standards

IEEE 802.3, IEEE 802.3u, IEEE 802.1D, IEEE 802.1Q, IEEE 802.1p, IEEE 802.3x, IEEE 802.1x