“Stupid Easy” DNS Protection for MSPs: 5th Gear Technology Concepts Case Study

All About 5th Gear Technology Concepts

Glenn Porter is the president of 5th Gear Technology Concepts, a Managed Service Provider in Nashville, TN that primarily caters to healthcare customers, though they do not work exclusively with the healthcare industry.

The scope of what an MSP provides has changed drastically over the last decade. It’s no longer just about monitoring customer networks, but also about proactively ensuring security.

When it comes to security, Glenn and 5th Gear are always looking to provide more value to their customers by adding extra layers of protection. They sought to mitigate risk and close cybersecurity gaps that are usually left when companies equip the bare minimum just to get by.

There and Back Again

Fifth Gear first signed up with DNSFilter in 2016, less than a year after the company was founded. But at that time, DNSFilter’s feature set was limited and their AI offering was still in its infancy.

Glenn liked the people and the direction of the product, but since the functionality wasn’t quite there yet he switched to OpenDNS for approximately 10 months until he decided to check in on the DNSFilter team to see how they were doing.

In that time, DNSFilter’s AI had improved dramatically and Glenn was blown away by how quickly DNSFilter improved. The rate of false positives had gone down noticeably, which decreased how much time Glenn spent spinning up new deployments.

“It’s easy for people to rest on their laurels, make a product and reap the benefits. DNSFilter is a constantly evolving product,” Glenn said.

Wrapped Up in a Security Blanket

When looking for DNS protection, Glenn was really after peace of mind. He wanted a solution that he could rely on as a failsafe if his other security precautions didn’t work as intended, while simultaneously blocking the content his customers were concerned about.

“It gives me more peace of mind knowing Billy and Susie can’t inadvertently click on a link and have it go to a known malicious website. Even if our other systems fail, I know DNSFilter’s got my back.”

Since DNSFilter added new deployment options and focused on making its AI top tier, Glenn no longer had to worry about constantly updating lengthy allow lists or flagging false positives. He knew DNSFilter would be running in the background, catching malicious threats and leaving essential websites unblocked.

Getting Results

“Wow. What did you do? Everything is running a little bit faster!”

According to Glenn, that’s one common response from his customers after they install DNSFilter for the first time. Thanks to the number of Anycast nodes and the resiliency built into DNSFilter, we have the fastest DNS resolver in North America. And 5th Gear’s customers have taken notice.

Since most of Glenn’s customers are in the same industry, he applies a blanket policy across all environments that blocks ad networks, malicious sites, and other sites that consume major resources. They’ve gotten a lot of positive feedback with this implementation, and no one has ever complained about suddenly finding inappropriate content for work inaccessible.

Now, as Glenn gets new customers onboarded he doesn’t have to worry about a hefty DNS filtering deployment. He can get a new customer setup in under 10 minutes using the MSP Dashboard and Global Policies.

In Glenn’s Own Words

Glenn isn’t interested in technology solutions that try to do it all while doing nothing particularly well. He sought a DNS filtering solution and wanted one that he could trust as an additional security layer that did its job.

DNSFilter is cost-effective with a simple user interface that gives his team more flexibility; that’s what he loves about this solution.

“There are so many products out there that promise the moon and they don’t deliver. I don’t have days or weeks to dedicate to learning a product inside out.” He needs something easy. When you want to get up and running quickly and move on with your day, the best tools are the ones that give you your time back.

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