Microsoft Exchange Server 2007Customer Solution Case Study

U.S. Army Increases Data Protection, Boosts Productivity with Messaging

OverviewCountry or Region: United StatesIndustry: Government―Defense

Customer ProfileThe United States Army is the largest branch of the U.S. Armed Forces. Its Program Executive Office for Enterprise Information Systems develops, deploys, and manages IT solutions.

Business SituationBecause e-mail is the organization’s main communication tool, and most information sent through e-mail is highly classified, the Army needs to offer reliable management and data protection for users.

SolutionThe Army recently deployed Microsoft® Exchange Server 2007 Service Pack 1, a new solution that provides built-in data protection, among other features.

Benefits Increased data protection Improved IT administration Reduced overhead costs Improved replication features Increased user productivity

“Because Exchange Server 2007 SP1 provides a built-in ability to digitally sign and encrypt e-mail messages, our IT administrators don’t have to worry as much about e-mail security.”Lt. Col. C.J. Wallington, Director, Advanced Technologies, U.S. Army Program E-mail is the primary communication and collaboration method for soldiers and officers in the United States Army. Protecting the organization’s e-mail messages is critical because users send and receive highly confidential information and need to sign and encrypt many of their messages. The Army also requires a reliable method for backing up and recovering its e-mail data. And, most Army employees access their e-mail over the Internet, so they need advanced features to be productive. Recently, the Army deployed Microsoft® Exchange Server 2007 Service Pack 1, which offers new encryption capabilities and improved replication as well as enhanced Web-access functionality. With this solution, the Army has increased data protection and implemented data replication while lowering costs. Improved IT capabilities save IT managers time, and new calendaring features boost overall user productivity.

SituationThe United States Army is the largest branch of the U.S. Armed Forces, with more than 1.2 million officers, soldiers, and civilian employees. The organization’s Program Executive Office for Enterprise Information Systems (PEO EIS), located in Ft. Belvoir, Virginia, provides IT solutions for office-based employees and soldiers throughout the Army. PEO EIS develops, acquires, integrates, and deploys software solutions around the world.

One of the Army’s most important tasks is managing its Microsoft® Exchange Server 2003 messaging and collaboration environment. “E-mail is unofficially the official command and control mode of the U.S. Army,” says Lt. Col. C.J. Wallington, who leads the 12-person Advanced Technologies directorate. “For example, Army soldiers deployed in war zones overseas send e-mail messages to their families, and in many cases that may be the only form of messaging these soldiers have.”

The Army also relies on e-mail for day-to-day business operations, such as sending and receiving slide presentations. “E-mail is even preferred over the telephone,” says Wallington. “If it’s late at night, someone in a different time zone that has a question for me might not want to call me on the phone, but they can send an e-mail message and I might still be online. That is convenient, given that we have so many employees spread across different

time zones throughout the world during peacetime and while we’re at war.”

Many Army employees use Microsoft Office Outlook® Web Access to send and receive e-mail messages. “Because they can use it from any Web browser on any PC wherever they are, Outlook Web Access is a valuable application for us and helps increase user productivity,” Wallington says.

Ensuring the confidentiality of e-mail messages is a major concern for the Army. “It’s very important for the Army to secure its information, both from a classification perspective and also a general use standpoint. Because we’re an Army at war, there are many people who want to see what we do, and who want more information about what we’re doing,” says Wallington. “We’re also concerned about the prevalence of identity theft, which is a growing problem worldwide.”

Additionally, Army employees regularly need to sign and encrypt e-mail messages. Wallington, along with every other officer and soldier, uses a smartcard called the Common Access Card for identification and e-mail encryption. The organization needed to upgrade to a solution that was compatible with this encryption tool.

The Army also wanted a more effective, reliable backup and recovery solution. “As you might expect, much of the information we’re

“Because the Exchange Server 2007 SP1 deployment cycle is so much shorter, I can put a more reliable, more powerful product in users’ hands sooner, and that makes them more productive.”Lt. Col. C.J. Wallington, Director,

passing back and forth in e-mail needs to be documented and sometimes referred back to,” Wallington says.

To address these needs, the Army started looking for new messaging features in late 2006.

SolutionIn early 2007, the U.S. Army began testing Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 Service Pack 1 (SP1), which includes enhanced Office Outlook Web Access functionality. For instance, support for the Secure/ Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions (S/MIME) protocol makes it possible for Outlook Web Access users to view and compose digitally signed or encrypted e-mail messages.

Additional Outlook Web Access features included in Exchange Server 2007 SP1 are monthly calendar views, public folder access, support for viewing 2007 Microsoft Office system file formats, and recovery of deleted items. With these features, users can be more flexible and productive in terms of communicating.

Exchange Server 2007 SP1 also features standby continuous replication (SCR), providing enhanced replication and recovery capabilities to organizations that use Exchange Server 2007 in clustered data center environments. For IT administrators, the solution has a new graphical user interface and management console for managing public folders. Security has also been bolstered, with new

integration with Microsoft Forefront™ Security for Exchange Server SP1.

The Army’s Advanced Technologies directorate deployed Exchange Server 2007 SP1 to 7,700 users in July 2007, including all employees in the PEO EIS headquarters. The organization is currently running the solution on the Windows Server® 2003 Enterprise Edition operating system. It plans to upgrade to Windows Server 2008 Enterprise because Exchange Server 2007 SP1 features support for installation on Windows Server 2008. The Army intends to add an additional 3,000 users to its Exchange Server SP 1 infrastructure by the end of 2007.

BenefitsWith Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 SP1, the U.S. Army has an updated messaging solution that increases data protection, improves IT administrative capabilities, and lowers overhead costs. The solution also gives the Army improved replication and recovery functionality as well as a way to increase user productivity.

Increased Data ProtectionMicrosoft Exchange Server 2007 SP1 offers the U.S. Army more built-in protection than the organization had previously, through features such as S/MIME-enabled Outlook Web Access and S/MIME-enabled mobile devices running Exchange ActiveSync®. “Because Exchange Server 2007 SP1 provides a built-in ability to digitally sign and encrypt e-mail messages, our IT administrators don’t have to worry as much about e-mail security,”

“Exchange Server 2007 SP1 with SCR [standby continuous replication] gives us the ability to have redundancy and recoverability with simplicity and low costs.”Lt. Col. C.J. Wallington, Director, Advanced Technologies, U.S. Army Program Executive Office for Enterprise Information Systems

says Wallington. “Outlook Web Access is more secure than before. As a result, this solution integrates much better with our Common Access Card, which is a tool our employees rely on every day.”

Exchange Server 2007 SP1 also includes advanced Exchange ActiveSync policies, giving IT administrators new security and management features such as the ability to apply new policies to mobile devices for authentication and encryption. “Exchange Server 2007 SP1 gives the Army more secure access to critical communications and information,” Wallington says.

Improved IT AdministrationArmy IT managers also benefit from improved IT administration capabilities. For example, Exchange Server 2007 SP1 includes new controls and enhancements to the Exchange Management Shell, enabled by the Windows PowerShell™ command line interface.

“Previously, we had to write special code for certain commands, which was time-consuming,” says Wallington. “But with the new [Windows] PowerShell command line interface, I only need to type a few words to apply permissions to the entire network. This new simplicity makes redundant, scriptable tasks very easy and adds efficiency to our jobs. I can now quickly script a complete Exchange Server 2007 SP1 setup and configuration.”

Additionally, new transport rules give Army IT staff members increased security capabilities. “With the transport rule feature in Exchange Server 2007 SP1, we can provide users with more classification capabilities,” says Wallington. “They can now add tags to their e-mail messages, for example.”

Reduced Overhead CostsBecause of the improved security and administrative functionality of its updated messaging system, the U.S. Army will also be able to save money on administrative overhead. “Our user management costs will be much less with Exchange Server 2007 SP1,” Wallington says. “Users are able to authenticate [their identity] to their mailboxes with their Common Access Card, which means there are not as many password resets.”

Wallington adds that the deployment of Exchange Server 2007 SP1 is simple due of its integration with the Windows-based IT infrastructure used by the Army. “Installation is fast and easy,” he says. “Because the Exchange Server 2007 SP1 deployment cycle is so much shorter, I can put a more reliable, more powerful product in users’ hands sooner, and that makes them more productive.”

Improved Replication and Recovery The solution’s standby continuous replication feature will also help the Army. With SCR, Exchange Server 2007 SP1 continuously replicates mailbox data to a standby server

“Because the Exchange Server 2007 SP1 deployment cycle is so much shorter, I can put a more reliable, more powerful product in users’ hands sooner, and that makes them more productive.”Lt. Col. C.J. Wallington, Director,

computer using built-in technology. As a result, the Army will be able to recover in a short time from any power outages.

“With standby continuous replication in Exchange Server 2007 SP1, we can replicate at remote sites to create any number of copies of our important data,” Wallington says. “SCR gives us the ability to have a recoverable Exchange Server 2007 environment located anywhere, with built-in functionality. That’s a big deal for us in terms of fault tolerance and recoverability.”Now that the Army can use these SCR capabilities, it can create a distributed mailbox cluster at multiple sites, which means additional cost savings. “This solution incorporates multisite clustering and failover, which eliminates the need to incorporate third-party products for those,” says Wallington. “Exchange Server 2007 SP1 with SCR gives us the ability to have redundancy and recoverability with simplicity and low costs.”

Also, because the Army will be able to migrate to Exchange Server 2007 SP1 on Windows Server 2008, it will have advanced clustering capabilities. “Windows Server 2008 will give us the ability to easily deploy Exchange Server 2007 SP1 clusters at multiple sites,” says Wallington.

Increased User ProductivityExchange Server 2007 SP1 also includes enhancements to Outlook Web Access, such as deleted item recovery and monthly calendar view

capabilities. In addition, the new Outlook Web Access has a redesigned user interface that is almost exactly like the Microsoft Office Outlook messaging and collaboration software that many Army users were already familiar with. “The Outlook Web Access interface is immensely improved in Exchange Server 2007 SP1,” says Wallington. “It’s easier to use and has a much richer feature set than before.”

Using the new features, Army employees can easily share their calendar information with colleagues and can set their availability to “free” or “busy” with a simple action. “Most of us live by our calendars,” says Wallington. “Because we use them so much and put all our important information in them, Outlook Web Access takes a lot of the guesswork away from trying to schedule conferences, for example. Now, instead of sending an e-mail to people and waiting for them to respond with an available meeting time, I can instantly see that information.”

As a result, according to Wallington, users will be able to accomplish more. “With Exchange Server 2007 SP1, employees will be able to spend less time tracking people down and more time getting work done,” he says. “Their productivity is definitely going to be higher now.”

Microsoft Server Product PortfolioFor more information about the Microsoft server product portfolio, go to:www.microsoft.com/servers

For more information about Microsoft Exchange Server, go to:www.microsoft.com/exchange

For More InformationFor more information about Microsoft products and services, call the Microsoft Sales Information Center at (800) 426-9400. In Canada, call the Microsoft Canada Information Centre at (877) 568-2495. Customers who are deaf or hard-of-hearing can reach Microsoft text telephone (TTY/TDD) services at (800) 892-5234 in the United States or (905) 568-9641 in Canada. Outside the 50 United States and Canada, please contact your local Microsoft subsidiary. To access information using the World Wide Web, go to: www.microsoft.com

For more information about United States Army products and services, visit the Web site at: www.army.mil

This case study is for informational purposes only. MICROSOFT MAKES NO WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, IN THIS SUMMARY.

Document published October 2007

Software and Services Microsoft Server Product Portfolio

− Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition

− Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 Service Pack 1

Technologies− Microsoft Office Outlook Web

Access