NETWORK MANAGEMENT TOOL
USERAUDIT

The Problem
Major organisations frequently need to monitor the usage of the network in order to quantify and plan for the effective deployment of network resources/applications and to be aware of how these costly resources are being utilised by the individual User. Obtaining this information in a useable format can be very difficult. Although Windows does record some basic User activity in the Windows event log this is rarely in the format required and requires considerable effort to filter and report the data. The Windows event log data is not central and data is stored on individual workstations.

The Solution - UserAudit
UserAudit provides an efficient method for recording and reporting various types of user activity including logon location and time, logoff time and application usage. A system service installed on the client workstation constantly monitors the user activity and reports this information (in real-time) to a central database server. The central database can store a huge number of transactions and can be filtered to produce detailed reports on any aspect of user activity. UserAudit can also be configured to prevent undesirable applications from being executed on a workstation depending on the Workstation used or the current user's logon name.

Network activity recording
UserAudit is a tool that helps network administrators in several ways. It shows, via detailed reports and easy to read charts, exactly what applications are being used on the network by whom, where and when. These reports include usage by:
• Application
• Department
• Workstation
• User
• Course (for schools and colleges)

Application execution control
UserAudit can prevent unauthorised applications from being executed on a workstation. This allows administrators to prevent users from running time wasting or bandwidth hungry applications such as automatic download tools or peer to peer applications.

Tracking down system abuse
By knowing who is on the network at any given time, administrators can narrow down the causes of disruptive or abusive activity. As system abuse is traced and dealt with, those who may be considering abuse in the future will be deterred.

Application license planning
Each organisation will have a certain number of licences for the applications that they run. UserAudit will allow administrators to monitor the applications being run and assist in pinpointing where additional licenses are needed and where the license level has yet to be reached.

Workstation crash report
UserAudit tracks system crashes, so workstations can be monitored for reliability. Even though the user may restart their workstation immediately, UserAudit will still detect and log the times and locations of unwanted crashes and produce a report to assist with network maintenance.

Comprehensive reporting
The reporting from UserAudit is comprehensive, to provide a thorough insight into User activity on your network. You can choose which parameters to summarise, from the following:
• Time period - set the time, from and to.
• Time measurement - minutes, hours or days
• User - login name (regardless of location)
• Location - workstation name (room and building)
• Department - Accounts, Marketing, Course or faculty.
• Application - by licence held

Corrective action
An email will alert the administrator of unauthorised access or other violations enabling preventive action to be taken. Along with continuous monitoring detecting unauthorised access to applications, the system can terminate an application to prevent such unauthorised activity. Workstations can be locked from a remote location to prevent access and stop a user from abusing the system.

back to top