Case Study: Network Infrastructure & Solutions for Medical Centers

This case study analyzes the network infrastructure and solutions for a medical center aiming to upgrade its system to accommodate a growing client base and multiple branches. The existing infrastructure, based on Macintosh computers and a LAN network with limited bandwidth, faces challenges in scalability and security. The proposed solutions include integrating fog computing services for faster access, optimizing network architecture, and enhancing cyber security to protect sensitive data. The report addresses potential cyber threats like DDoS attacks and emphasizes the importance of a robust security policy, proactive surveillance, and collaboration with ISPs. It also outlines the project goals, including cost-effective implementation and improved data management. Ultimately, the study provides a roadmap for network engineers to optimize network infrastructure, mitigate threats, and ensure efficient communication within the expanding medical center.

Running head: NETWORK INFRASTRUCTURE AND SOLUTIONS
Network infrastructure and solutions
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

1NETWORK INFRASTRUCTURE AND SOLUTIONS
Table of Contents
Introduction................................................................................................................................2
Discussion..................................................................................................................................3
Existing Infrastructure............................................................................................................4
Problems.................................................................................................................................4
Project Goals..........................................................................................................................5
Cyber Security........................................................................................................................5
Implementation of the Fog services.....................................................................................10
Conclusion................................................................................................................................13
References................................................................................................................................14

2NETWORK INFRASTRUCTURE AND SOLUTIONS
Introduction
This case study is stands on the structure of network infrastructure and solutions in a
medical centre. This medical centre is structured as a small setup but this medical system
stands on the composition of a total of 5000 clients. This is the reason for which it will be
difficult to manage the flow of the working architecture of the system. This report aims to
incorporate the techniques through which the new network system will improvise the
working architecture of the system thereby improving the optimizing technique of the current
system (Kim & Feamster, 2013). In the business point of view and the commercial vision, it
is very much required to implement a system that is cost friendly as well as the same time
serving a quality experience. However, judging the present situations, all the services along
with other amenities are proving to be expensive, for which it will be difficult to implement
such a system. The prime criterion is focussed on the infrastructure of the network through
which the project cost can be saved.
The Network infrastructure is technical terms can be expressed as the integration of
the hardware and a software in a sophisticated network that can be implemented in an
organisation for the betterment of the communication. The network engineers are hired by
almost every big enterprise with high salaries due to the fact the work of those engineers are
very complex and difficult to accomplish (Wählisch, M., Schmidt & Vahlenkamp, 2013). In
addition, their objective is focussed in the optimization of the network infrastructure to
achieve a rapid and bettered communication. The network infrastructure is based on the inter
communication among the users all across the network for which the organisations should
focus on its up gradation. It would be hectic at times to successfully manage the
modifications in the network system due to inadequate revenue (Yu et al., 2013). According
to that reason, the network engineers are given the responsibility to deliver with the best

3NETWORK INFRASTRUCTURE AND SOLUTIONS
results by finding the suited roadmap in the optimization of the network infrastructure, which
is mainly founded on the internal requirements of the company, as there are other services as
well. These services also focus in the better communication. Many companies suffer the issue
of slow networking which affect the company performance for which a proper networking
infrastructure is required.
Discussion
The case study of the medical centre on the networking services is based on serving
only a single branch but in case of multiple branches, it would be difficult to implement and
manage such a system that serves the networking infrastructure of the organisation. In that
case, a upgrading, the infrastructure will be required. This report aide in serving the same
solution.
Information exchange through the network is a prime factor that requires the
implementation of a proper ICT system in the organisation for experiencing a fluent
transmission of data within the organisation (Lu et al., 2013). There are studies that are based
on the communication of data through the network system. One of such system is the
autonomous systems that are difficult and more complex to infer. Generally, data is always
large in small organisations such as the medical centre in this case because a lot of
information regarding the interaction of the stakeholders among themselves for the booking
and registration processes are stored. To store this information a proper functional
networking system should be implemented, as these data are complex in nature (Law,
Buhalis, & Cobanoglu, 2014). The following section will talk about the proposal of an
improved networking system, as the present system of the medical centre will be inadequate
in delivering information of the services of other branches.

4NETWORK INFRASTRUCTURE AND SOLUTIONS
Existing Infrastructure
The present infrastructure of the medical centre is standing on the Macintosh
computers along with the Local Area Network (LAN) that is comprised of limited bandwidth
as the connection with all the computers are made with the help of a database such as the
central database which contain the information of the 5000 clients stored in it (Wang et al.,
2015). These information are not encrypted. It is due to this reason that a functional database
should be implemented for ensuring proper services. The existing infrastructure also consist a
booking system that primarily focuses on serving that branch but now with many branches of
the medical centre the booking software system needs to be updated (Waliullah,
Moniruzzaman & Rahman, 2015).
Problems
The management of the medical centre aspires to expand the business and also aspires
to upgrade the system because a new branch of the medical centre will involve many new
users. The present networking infrastructure will not be able to serve the purposes of the
medical centre as the current system only focuses on the main branch of the medical centre
and the management system will not be able to serve the purposes when there will be several
other branches (Algaet et al., 2015). For this reason, the current networking system needs an
upgrade where the security will be kept as a major heading since there will be many other
databases managing the records of several other users. The security issues should also be
severely dealt with while upgrading the old networking system. The present database of the
medical centre is having a limited storage for which there is a need of upgrading the new
database (Donati et al., 2013). In upgrading the database the system may face a lot of issues
regarding the crashing issue for which it is important to integrate the new system.

5NETWORK INFRASTRUCTURE AND SOLUTIONS
Project Goals
The project goals of the new system are stated as the following:
 Integrating the fog computing services for having a fast access of the system as the
fog computing is based on arranging the a small cloud server that is closely located to
the accessible area from where information can be easily stored and retrieved at the
same time (Bonomi.et al., 2014).
 Full optimization of the network architecture to provide the users with an effective
accessing experiencing of the system.
 Cyber security is a major issue while the implementation of the new network system
and accordingly it will be addressed for providing an assurance about the quality of
the services (Von Solms & Van Niekerk, 2013).
Cyber Security
The Multinational companies are subjected to a lot of hassles in course maintaining
the privacy of data and the cyber security. Every enterprise is composed of several intricate
details that needs special protection and can only be accessed with the grant of special
permission (Hahn et al., 2013). On the other hand, these details can be subjected to the
hackers and the attackers. After getting the valuable information these attackers may misuse
this valuable information for which there is an urgent need to work on the cyber security.
In the world of commerce and marketing, executives are shifting their business in an
online platform so that there is an expansion of the business. The prime risk is concerned
about the cyber security and privacy of data as the businesses in the online platform is related
about the consideration of the transactional services of the customers (Wells et al., 2014).
This is pertained as the most intricate information and information security is very such
essential to avoid the data loss and the denied access of the information. Hacking threats such

6NETWORK INFRASTRUCTURE AND SOLUTIONS
as Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks will be taken into account for the online
business because those hacking threats can be responsible for the websites and the web
services to run through a downtime phase by letting an allowance of fake traffic during a
specific period of time (Darwish, Ouda & Capretz, 2013). Those attacks may be held
responsible for the loss of data and website crashes. There are several other services through
which the problem can be sorted out but that would be very much expensive, for which a
proper solution serving the problem at a reasonable cost is required.
The objectives and the aims of this report intends to supply with proper information
about the security of services and the privacy of data. It also provides the architecture
following which the issues can be sorted out. The solution that would be proposed will be
cost effective using which the vendors can easily get the access to use the services. These
services will be taken into account as these services play a major role in the market
contribution. The details regarding the current security algorithms will be discussed in this
report to prove that the provided solution is completely new and current in the present market
of networking and security.
The following sections will provide an extensive reference to the network engineers
as it will be covered up with all the information regarding the problems and the mitigation
techniques about the network threats that are needed to be considered while implementing a
new networking system (Ning, Liu & Yang, 2013). This report will also serve as a model for
the cyber security solutions and the optimizing of the services through which the hacking
threats such as the Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) can be prohibited. DDoS attack is
considered to be one of the most dangerous attacks in the cyber security domain because
these attacks will completely destroy the web servers and disrupt the web services. Activists
all over the world are working sorting out these malicious attacks and based on the same
analogy this report also intends to provide a cost effective solution that will help in

7NETWORK INFRASTRUCTURE AND SOLUTIONS
eradicating these attacks considering a specific region. In addition to that, this report also
talks about the other network threats are also discussed in this report.
The DDoS attacks in the present marketplace conditions has been modified to a great
extent which is capable of creating a havoc at a minimum cost. There are several types of
DDoS threats that the organisations can face during processes online. SYN flood attacks,
NTP reflection based attacks, DNS amplified attacks and the Application layer attacks are
some of the well known DDoS attacks. To figure out the approximate number of threats that
must be mitigated, a penetration test must be performed. The most common devices that are
prone to threats are the computer devices and the portable devices (Abawajy, 2014). There
must be a security policy whose objective will be to prevent the possibilities of a potential
DDoS attack. There should be a proactive surveillance of the entire networking system. A
surplus bandwidth should be provided to accompany the possible surges in the network
traffic. The network parameters of the organisations should be taken into account and should
be defended accordingly. The threats related to the Application layer should also be detected.
In addition to that, a collaboration with the Internet Service Provider (ISP) is also required. If
these conditions are not met, there is a high possibility that the organisation will be subjected
to a DDoS attack stating Invalid source specified. This is one of the common threats out
there and can pose a serious threat to the organisations, which might be shocking to the
business domain. The economic systems along with the systems that serve customer insights
are at greater risks due to these malicious threats. It is because of this reason that these
systems must be kept under strict surveillance and provide with a strengthened security.
Generally, the large enterprises contain a separate group of team members that
delivers in the focussing of the networking security. It is also seen that the IT team sometimes
look after this networking issue. These teams also look after the development and the
implementation of the security policy whose aim will be to resist and lessen the DDoS on the

8NETWORK INFRASTRUCTURE AND SOLUTIONS
assets and the clients of the company. An ideal security policy should include the following
arguments:
The network traffic should be kept under strict surveillance regularly. In case of
getting affected with the malicious attacks it is the responsibility of the IT team to request the
Internet Provider for the graphs and the records so that the company is able to go to its
provider and successfully figure out the IP that is returning the Invalid source specified.
There are different tools that help to survey the traffic and among them Netflow is considered
to be the most enhanced tool that is responsible for monitoring. Generally a regular Netflow
or a sampled Netflow is used depending on the available bandwidth and the dedicate
hardware.
A network infrastructure is essential especially for the protection of the control pane
of the hardware and the management. Utilisation of the authentication and the encrypted
protocols should be done for the management of equipment. The authentication requests that
are from outside the networks are needed to be completely filtered (Ben-Asher & Gonzalez,
2015). For accessing the routers and the switches, Out of Band (OOB) management is
recommended and should be configured accordingly of those devices. Access control will be
taken over by an AAA system (Cisco ACS) that is a two factor authentication using either the
RADIUS or TACACS+. The ACS will be used to provide with different authorization levels
that is related with the position of the employees and their skill sets on various fields. ACS
will offer an audit trail during the time of accessing the portals. In addition to that Secure
Shell (SSH) is needed to be used in accesing the routers and the switches.
Scanning and auditing of the networks along with the servers is required to take place
in routine manner all along the year. In this mechanism the servers and the networking
equipment is required to be scanned from an unknown IP address. The Nmap and Nessus

9NETWORK INFRASTRUCTURE AND SOLUTIONS
scans is required to take place with an interval of four months. After this, the administrators
of the system will be informed before the implementation of the scans, providing them with
an opportunity to either fix the disputes of the system or eliminate the systems from the
sandbox. Special attention should be made on these scan lists, as these scans are able to cease
these services that can pose a negative effect on the productivity.
The original cost of the proposed networking system is expected to be around
$300,000. The cost for the maintenance agreements is expected to be around $25,000 per
year. The whole system is expected to be fully operational within the six months of getting
the resources. The configuration and the installation phase will be provided with scheduled
maintenance windows for the procedure of management. The configuration modifications is
apprehended to take place during the non shift hours unless there is an urge to make during
the shift hours. The system is also expected to provide the users with hassle free experience
and reliability. The implementation procedure will also provide the users with the reduction
of the threats thereby providing them with a shelter to where they can easily make
transactions and store their valuable information. The system is also expected to be PCI-DSS
compliant. It is expected as such because it reduces the liability risk in case there is an
atrocious attack. All the above mentioned are some of the devices, policies and the
mechanisms to reduce the risks of the DDoS attacks (Knowles et al., 2015). New ways are
constantly being developed to counter the new hacking threats and other forms of malicious
DDoS attacks. It is essential to keep this in mind that one of these mentioned solutions will
surely work in providing an additional security to the networks. However, a network is still
prone to attack no matter how much protection is designated for the protection of the
network. The surveillance tools provide with an opportunity to detect attacks in the real time,
keeping the traffic separate and lessening the impact. This not only provides a protection to
the business but also allow an opportunity to have a hassle free online experience.

10NETWORK INFRASTRUCTURE AND SOLUTIONS
However, there are certain limitations in the entropy method of this plan, as it is
somehow ineffective when the network is subjected to multiple DDoS attacks. In multiple
DDoS attacks, the attacking traffic targets several destinations for the attack resulting in the
insignificance of the changes in entropy. A more effective detection algorithm for these type
of cases is the flow initiation rate.
In the above mentioned algorithm the initial threshold is considered to be fixed at a
certain level that is taken as the traffic level of acceptance for the network and at such rate the
network will not face any trouble thereby operating freely. In the initial learning phase this
threshold can be calculated by inferring the controller while the allowed traffic is going at an
average to a very low rate. However, this threshold must be suitable for the network to depict
the present flow of the traffic pattern.
Implementation of the Fog services
In the present day conditions the total amount of mobile users are increasing day by
day as more number of users are implementing the mobile technologies for having a fluent
communication experience. The users are more inclined towards using the reliable services
for the communication and the process of storing data (Meurisch et al., 2017). Earlier it was
hectic to store data in the physical data centres as it was much expensive in nature and there
were several other factors that prohibited the set up of those data centres. The developers and
other experts initialize the cloud computing services for the optimizing the data storage
services (Stojmenovic & Wen, 2014). In the genre of cloud computing, the users are free to
store and access data from anywhere as the cloud services are dependent on the online
platforms for which the cloud databases are granted as the online databases. The involvement
of the cloud services in a system is essential because the users get an easy opportunity to
access the services. However, the cloud services are often subjected to latency issue and weak

11NETWORK INFRASTRUCTURE AND SOLUTIONS
connection of the internet for which the concept of the Fog computing has come into play
(Yi, Li & Li 2015).
The concept of fog computing mainly deals with the coverage of small areas in
accordance to the users in that place. It is advantageous to cloud computing because the users
and the servers are closely located and the latency rate is much lower (Dastjerdi & Buyya,
2016). The fog database is considered as the local database since the fog database is entirely
structured on the local router of the user.
An example of the cloud computing is the usage of smartphones and the online
services within the city (Aazam & Huh, 2014). This experience is improved with
implementation of the fog computing where the access rate is much higher as compared to
that of cloud computing. It is the fact cloud computing is much reliable service for the users
for whom the latency and the received packet data is not a factor but for those who rely on
these factors, cloud computing will not be enough as cloud computing is subjected to high
latency rate and signal distortions (Zhu et al., 2013). This problem can be solved with the
implementation of the fog computing because the data stored in the databases of cloud will be
reused by fog computing in bettering the user experience. Fog computing is the extension of
the cloud computing where the user experience is enhanced. Data security is another factor in
distinguishing these two concepts. Due to the higher latency rate the data in cloud computing
is vulnerable to several threats and attacks but that is not a concern in case of the fog
computing because the latency rate is much lower for which it disallows any illicit access of
the network.
Fog computing has a lesser scope as compared to that of the cloud computing for
which the hardware storage and the power consumption is limited in fog computing
(Stojmenovic, 2014). The interfaces of the wireless connections are also considered in a very