ICS cyber security is an increasingly complex pursuit that now extends well beyond basic perimeter protection and simple air-gap implementations. Today's ICS security and operations experts now seek to integrate sustained system uptime and human safety into their operational protocols.
ICS systems are automated by computers, sensors and software with little to no human intervention on a daily, 24/7 basis. When day-to-day automated routines seem to be spinning along, with no alarms, all is well as far as operators know. However, the most dangerous and destructive intrusions are those that ‘fly under the radar’ and use existing protocols so not to raise alarms and draw as little attention as possible, while the malware compromises as much as possible.
With ICS M2M communication, determining abnormal network operations in the absence of alarms need not be mysterious. This session will demonstrate typical and unusual scenarios, using common SCADA protocols, to depict a day in the life of control systems and their communications. Experts will present a battle of the defenses to highlight the absence of security at the endpoint level and then contrast traditional firewalls versus NGFW (next-generation firewalls) versus true protocol parsing and the risks/benefits of each. Attendees will come away equipped to better evaluate and weigh their options for protecting critical control systems.
KEY TOPICS & TAKE AWAYS
