Cybersecurity and the Impact on Operational Technologies
Cybersecurity is the broad term given to technologies and processes designed to protect networked equipment, software and data from unauthorized access, attack or damage.
As the world becomes more interconnected, networked equipment, software and data are increasingly susceptible to security breaches. In the past, the protection of such equipment, software and data was the sole responsibility of information technology (IT) teams. However, as more devices are introduced and more operational technology (OT) takes advantage of IT networks, the attack surface becomes more difficult to control and monitor. The attack surface is a point of vulnerability such as a port, device or software interface where an unauthorized user could attempt to enter or extract data from a network. Now, IT and OT teams must work together to assess areas of risk that have not been considered in the past.