How Fairfax County Public Schools Gained Control and Confidence with Axonius
Fairfax County Public Schools (FCPS) is Virginia’s largest public school district and the ninth largest in the United States, serving nearly 183,000 students across 199 schools and 11 centers. With a diverse community and a commitment to world-class education, FCPS relies on a robust Office of Cybersecurity to protect sensitive student and staff data and ensure uninterrupted learning across a sprawling and dynamic IT landscape.
This is the story of how Fairfax County Public Schools turned the chaos of incomplete asset visibility into a streamlined, proactive cybersecurity powerhouse, thereby protecting over 183,000 students and thousands of staff every day, thanks to Axonius.
Key Challenges
Lack of a centralized, accurate inventory across a vast IT environment
Unmanaged devices creating blind spots and security gaps
Siloed data hampering cross-team collaboration
Inefficient, manual tracking consuming valuable time and resources
Growing regulatory demands and sophisticated threats outpacing old methods
Axonius has significantly enhanced our cybersecurity posture. It enables us to proactively identify and remediate vulnerabilities...
Introduction
David Mikhail, Senior Manager of Threat and Vulnerability Management within FCPS’s Office of Cybersecurity, leads a seven-person team charged with safeguarding a complex digital environment supporting 183,000 students and over 40,000 employees. But as threats grew more sophisticated, so did the challenge of securing countless devices, software, and networks, many invisible to existing tools.
Cybersecurity asset management is crucial for K–12 schools. It’s our tech inventory. It lets us find weaknesses before attackers do...
Yet, despite dedication and skilled staff, David’s team struggled to see everything they needed to protect.
Previous Situation
Before Axonius, FCPS’s security world was fragmented. Each team kept its own partial records. No one had a clear, reliable picture of all devices and software across the vast district. This blind spot was more than an inconvenience. It was a daily source of stress and risk.
Before implementing Axonius, we lacked a comprehensive and reliable inventory of all our assets. This hindered our ability to manage and secure our environment effectively...
Unmanaged devices lurked undetected, some missing critical security controls like endpoint protection or vulnerability scanning. Communication between IT and security teams suffered under inconsistent data and unclear responsibilities.
Challenges
This lack of unified visibility created daily operational headaches and amplified security risk. Security assessments took longer. Vulnerability scans missed targets. Incident response dragged on as teams scrambled to verify which devices were protected.
Unmanaged devices created significant blind spots. They often lacked essential security controls, increasing the risk of data breaches and other incidents...
And the stakes were massive. A security breach could compromise sensitive student records, damage community trust, invite regulatory penalties, and disrupt learning for thousands. Meanwhile, cyber threats were growing in sophistication, and compliance requirements were tightening. FCPS’s existing patchwork of asset records simply couldn’t keep up.
The cost of inaction loomed: increased threat exposure, regulatory trouble, wasted resources, and the risk of becoming tomorrow’s headline.
Consequences
FCPS faced mounting threats and an expanding digital attack surface while relying on outdated manual tracking. Without an accurate inventory, security teams couldn’t verify controls, quickly spot vulnerabilities, or respond confidently to incidents.
Without change, David’s team risked falling further behind, thereby leaving students and staff vulnerable to attack, and the district exposed to financial loss and reputational harm.
Solutions
FCPS discovered Axonius at a Gartner conference. What stood out? Simple implementation, robust support, and a powerful promise: see every asset with no blind spots.
Axonius met every key requirement:
Comprehensive asset discovery, and even finding previously hidden devices
A single, centralized view that broke down silos
Scalability to match the district’s evolving needs
Seamless integration with tools like Google, Aruba, CrowdStrike, Azure, SCCM, and Shodan
Within weeks, David’s team gained unprecedented visibility. They identified devices by operating system, pinpointed those missing critical controls, and automated manual tracking.
Axonius has significantly enhanced our cybersecurity posture. It enables us to proactively identify and remediate vulnerabilities
Now, the Office of Cybersecurity and other FCPS teams use customized dashboards to monitor vulnerable software, outdated operating systems, and unmanaged devices, making audits, assessments, and even penetration tests dramatically faster and more precise.
Results:
Gained full asset visibility within weeks, uncovering unmanaged devices across 199 schools and centers
Reduced the time to identify devices missing critical controls from months to days, and sometimes even hours
Cut time spent preparing for audits, assessments, and penetration tests by over 75%
Streamlined alert triage and incident response, freeing staff for strategic security work
Empowered teams with custom dashboards for proactive risk mitigation and compliance
Strengthened overall security posture, reducing exposure to data breaches and regulatory risk
Get Started
Discover what’s achievable with a product demo, or talk to an Axonius representative.