ALERT: OPpetrol campaign threatens cyberattacks on Energy sector

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Cybersecurity ALERT: OPpetrol cyber-attack threatens June 20th attack on the Energy sector As reported in the press and in a YouTube video, the Anonymous Group has issued a threat dubbed OPpetrol, to attack Western energy interests.  While the credibility of the threat has yet to be verified, this latest action represents an unprecedented and brazen threat to do harm to a sector already highly targeted over the last year.  Fortunately, energy companies and others in critical infrastructure << More >>

Skip NERC CIP version 4 and go straight to version 5

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On April 18th, 2013 FERC held a meeting in which it heard from NERC regarding the proposed Critical Infrastructure Protection version 5 standards. The committee voted to skip version 4 and move straight to version 5, and the recently issued Presidential executive order on critical infrastructure cyber security appeared to largely be the driving force behind the rapid movement. Some of the major changes for version 5 include: New risk-based tiered classification system for cyber assets: High, Me << More >>

Managing Change to Minimize Risk in Industrial Control Systems

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Recently the Aberdeen Group published a blog post hosted on Automation.com regarding the Aberdeen Group’s report titled “Operational Risk Management: Managing Change to Improve Productivity and Minimize Risk”. While the blog post does not specifically call out risk to “cyber” assets, the comparison is easy to make and an overlap of the findings becomes clearer. Also, given the complexity of today’s industrial control system environments, a lot of readers will be shaking their heads i << More >>

ABB qualifies additional integration with Industrial Defender ASM; see it at ABB APW or online

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“The integration and qualification of Industrial Defender’s ASM Manage as part of System 800xA combines industry-leading technologies so that customers can better monitor, manage, and protect their critical control system operations.”   - Jonas Brannvall, ABB Global Group Product Manager Just in time to show off Industrial Defender ASM integration at ABB Automation Power World 2013, ABB’s System 800xA product team has qualified the integration of their System 800xA with our flagship, A << More >>

“Who’s Really Attacking Your ICS Equipment?” whitepaper released by TrendMicro

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TrendMicro released a whitepaper by researcher Kyle Wilhoit, who also presented the “Who’s Really Attacking Your ICS Equipment?” research at the Black Hat EU 2013 conference in Amsterdam. The research presented Wilhoit’s observations of attacks on an Internet-facing honeypots set up to detect who and/or what is attacking ICS/SCADA devices that are on the Internet. Wilhoit’s honeypots, a mix of high and low-interaction honeypots, were designed to mimic the setup of a water pressure stat << More >>

NERC CIP v5 is Coming; START PREPARING NOW!

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It’s official: NERC CIP version 5 (v5) is scheduled for approval in April 2013 by FERC (Federal Energy Regulatory Commission). Over the years, NERC (North American Electric Reliability Corporation) CIP (Critical Infrastructure Protection) has provided compliance regulations that stretch across the electric industry. Although NERC is a moderately young organization, the most recent version (version 4) extended its reach to additional organizations across the electric sector, including nuclear f << More >>

Distributech wrap up

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While the focus of Distributech is the distribution component of utilities, the discussions spanned the “Smart Grid” gamut. Demand response, advanced metering infrastructure (AMI), distribution management systems, clean energy production, and securing the grid were some of the highlights of the opening keynote presentations. It’s no secret there is demand on the grid like never before. The last 10 years have provided technological advancements that are putting the need for demand response << More >>

OT vs. IT; the debate continues. ICS Security improving none-the-less

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The difference in perspectives and power struggles between It and OT continue slow the pace of improvements in SCADA and critical infrastructure security according to a recently published CSO Magazine article. Last week, ICS CERT announced the findings of two separate incidents where energy industry assets were infected with malware due to compromised USB devices. Over the past few years, concerns have grown as we’ve seen attacks like Stuxnet and Flame target Industrial Control Systems systems << More >>

Industrial Defender Recognized by Ovum Research as the Leader in Smart Grid Security Solutions

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We couldn’t be more proud to receive recognition from Ovum Research as the leading vendor of cyber security solutions for the Smart Grid. The Ovum Decision Matrix: Selecting a Smart Grid Security Solution*  is a 2013 vendor comparison that measures both market impact and customer satisfaction.  The results measure Industrial Defender as the leader, outranking several large IT firms including McAfee, IBM, Symantec, RSA and Cisco. *Ovum Research Jan. 11, 2013 Click this chart to register for << More >>

Red October: 3 mitigation strategies, and the need for cybersecurity basics

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If you didn’t catch the Kaspersky report on Red October, check it out here. Their map shows just how wide spread it was. There will certainly be a thorough dissection of the malware over the coming weeks. While Red October didn’t specifically affecting industrial control systems the oil and gas infrastructure that has been known to be targeted is in UAE, Russia, Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan. What it is though is a good lesson in overall security basics and best practices. It really highlights << More >>