Cyber breaches are on the rise for major companies and according to a study by Deloitte, the U.S. manufacturing sector is woefully unprepared for the cyber threats associated with new connected technology.
A new report “Industry 4.0 and cyber risk: Security in an age of connected production,” found that one-third of all manufacturers sampled admitted to not having performed any cyber risk assessments of the industrial connected devices operating on factory floors.
The study outlines the strategies that businesses must take to build cybersecurity efforts into their larger business plan and untimely protect their operations and their customers.
Key insights on some of the most significant cyber challenges manufacturers must address include:
Evolution of Cyber Risks from I3.0 to I4.0 – New cyber threats facing Industry 4.0 have built upon common Industry 3.0 attacks with malicious marketing campaigns, disruption of service attacks using botnets and privacy breaches, including the compromise of sensitive customer data and trade secrets, becoming top concerns.
More IoT Devices Equals More Vulnerabilities – Over 20 billion IoT devices are expected to be deployed around the world by 2020, with many of these devices being used in manufacturing facilities and production lines. As these devices are integrated further, manufacturers will need to implement their own safeguards and security practices to protect their operations and those that they depend on from third-parties.
Learnings From Other Industries Need to be Leveraged – As manufacturing has been behind the curve in adopting connected technology compared to other industries, learnings from other sectors like financial services should be incorporated into manufacturing strategies. New technologies like blockchain have the potential to help mitigate current cybersecurity risks by streamlining the flow of goods and information.
Given the breadth of risks, the report advises companies to take the following steps:
- Be secure. Take a measured, risk-based approach to what is secured and how to secure it. Is your intellectual property safe? Is your supply chain or ICS environment vulnerable?
- Be vigilant. Continually monitor systems, networks, devices, personnel, and the environment for possible threats. Real-time threat intelligence and AI are often required to understand harmful actions and quickly identify threats across the multitude of new connected devices that are being introduced.
- Be resilient. An incident could happen. How would your organization respond? How long would it take to recover? How quickly could you remediate the effects of an incident?
