Back to Basics around OT Security

Data may be “the new oil” for the manufacturing world but it cannot be taken for granted

This interesting piece in the Journal of Petroleum Technology made me think, not least because it does not mention in any way the data security imperative that needs to be at the heart of any data-driven digital transformation process.

I have not written much around OT security, but it keeps coming across my desk, and it is undoubtedly one of the hot topics of the moment, with countless tech vendors jumping on a band wagon they assume will be lucrative.

If we were to play the prediction game, I would argue this will be a hot topic for the years to come, given the level at which security maturity levels appear to be in some industries.

Back in 2021, I was concerned with the IT/OT convergence and the threat level this was introducing to previously isolated OT environments, that were otherwise more difficult to secure given their specificities. I was also concerned about the lack of integrated governance across IT and OT worlds, preventing a coordinated response to increasingly common threat agents and attack vectors.

I think those concerns are still relevant, but they seem to be underpinned on the OT side by a worrying lack of understanding…