Manufacturing Industry Security Challenges
- Likelihood of malware infection increases dramatically
- With increased connectivity, air-gapping becomes obsolete, patching is more difficult and expensive
- Shadow OT – undocumented devices running in the shadows
- OT and IT teams speak “different languages”
Manufacturing industries are increasingly migrating to smart manufacturing technologies as part of the ongoing fourth industrial revolution. With increased connectivity and advanced automation systems such as manufacturing execution systems (MES) that integrate plant floor production (ICS/SCADA networks) and enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems, manufacturing objectives revolve around maximizing productivity, but at the same time, they create new vulnerabilities and risks such as production manipulation, operational downtime, and sensitive data-theft threats.
In the last 5 years, manufacturing industries have been the victims of an increased number of cyberattacks, such as the Havex/Dragonfly campaign that targeted industrial control systems across the USA and Europe or the most well-known WannaCry and NotPetya that caused havoc in the automotive, food, pharmaceutical, and other manufacturing plants. Events like these result in significant revenue loss valued in the hundreds of millions of dollars, reputation damage, loss of competitive edge, and sometimes public and employee safety issues.