(a) Shared Services Canada (SSC) is a Government of Canada (GC) department entrusted with the transformation and ongoing management of the IT Infrastructure for 43 departments within the GC. This specification will descripted the desired capabilities for infrastructure components to support SSC’s fire wall infrastructure.
It has become imperative that the GC consider emerging security technologies for the protection of the perimeter of the GC. These new security solutions provide many security services on one platform. Currently there is a wide variety of technologies and vendors supporting the functions of Firewall, Web filtering, IPS, and VPN. The following are the SSC requirements for the acquisition of Unified Threat Management (UTM) technologies.
(b) It is intended to result in the award of a contract for two (2) years plus three (3) one year options.
(c) On May 28, 2012, the Government of Canada announced on the Government Electronic Tendering Service that it had invoked the National Security Exception under the trade agreements in respect of procurements related to email, networks and data centres for Shared Services Canada. As a result, this requirement is subject to the National Security Exception.