Before investing significant amounts of resources for security technology, companies are advised to carefully evaluate their risks. Two enterprises that carefully evaluated options are deploying smart solutions that can reduce security dangers and also integrate strategically into their business processes. At Mission Hospital, John Willars, MIS director of the private, non-profit medical center, is responsible for management of hospital and patient records and for ensuring that staff is connected. He chose a wireless LAN (WLAN) and is using advanced solutions that guide growth and keep the infrastructure secure. Nurses use wirelessly equipped Dell Inspiron notebook PCS on InfoLogix carts. Access points and routers are locked down to keep out surfers who want to gain access to the Internet, and Mission Hospital will guard patient information on hospital servers as the hospital launches Meditech Enterprise Medical Record. Willars is using the security features of the 802.11b WLAN and is also testing client/server-based software from Perfigo. The applications authenticate, authorize, assess, and fix devices logging into a corporate network. Willars is also looking at a Perfigo solution that will scan each device that is logging in to protect against viruses, worms, and destructive code. Sam Wilson, an IT specialist for JMP Securities, supports mobile professionals for secure access to applications and files on corporate servers with Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) virtual private network (VPN) technology from F5. Wilson users log in securely to a customized Web portal via Windows NT user names and passwords. The system saves Wilson and staff immeasurable quantities of time because the SSL VPN can be installed in 12 minutes, while customizing the portal's metaphor is much more time consuming.