Seattle Mariners score big with CA`s eTrust Secure Content Manager

And you thought facing a 95-mile per hour fastball was unnerving. Just try responding to 60,000 emails per week from baseball fans clamoring for tickets, roster updates and other team news while guarding against spam, viruses and other threats at the same time.

That`s what Major League Baseball`s Seattle Mariners are doing, and they`ve hit a home run with eTrust Secure Content Manager (eTrust SCM) from enterprise management software leader Computer Associates International, Inc. (CA).

eTrust SCM automatically protects the Mariner`s computing environment from viruses, spam and other threats - blocking potentially dangerous messages while allowing legitimate ones to pass through. In some ways, it`s the team `s new MVP - most valuable protector.

"CA`s eTrust SCM delivered immediate, quantifiable results for us and has already proven itself to be up to the formidable task of protecting our computing environment from both the dangers of viruses and the annoyance of spam," said Dave Curry, director of information systems for the Seattle Mariners. "This protection is essential for us to communicate quickly and safely with our fans."

The Mariners average more than 60,000 emails per week - and experience even higher volumes from major ticket promotions, player transactions and extended winning streaks. Responding to those emails is critical for maintaining positive relationships with its customers and fans around the world.

On average, more than 20 percent of all email the Mariners receive is either infected with a virus or is spam. On some email accounts, the amount of tainted messages is as high as 90 percent. These illegitimate messages threatened the ability of the team to quickly and reliably respond to the growing number of fans who prefer to communicate electronically.

With the start of the 2004 Major League Baseball season approaching, the Mariners decided to address this problem by implementing an email filtering solution and chose CA`s eTrust SCM.

eTrust SCM provides integrated, policy-based filtering of HTTP, SMTP and FTP traffic; automated scanning of malicious and/or inappropriate email and Web content; and a user self-management feature that empowers users to help filter unwanted content while reducing false positives. Using CA`s patented dual-scanning engine, eTrust SCM has been independently certified to detect 100% of in-the-wild viruses by Virus Bulletin.

The Mariners implemented eTrust SCM in January, during particularly intense virus activity that included the rapid proliferation of the Mydoom worm. eTrust SCM successfully blocked more than 20,000 infected emails in the first weekend - fully protecting the Mariners network.

"No organization has an unlimited amount of resources to throw at virus and spam defense," said Lina Liberti, vice president of eTrust security management at CA. "That`s why eTrust SCM is so compelling to customers like the Seattle Mariners who know that great communications are essential to great customer relationships."