Industry 4.0: building cybersecurity into the heart of your digital transformation

 Industry 4.0 Cyberattacks Cybersecurity IoT Cloud Artificial intelligence

While digital technologies promise huge productivity gains and disruptive innovations in all sectors of industry, they also expose companies to a growing array of cyber risks. The tools used to perpetrate attacks are widely available and hacking techniques are constantly evolving. As you embrace all the benefits of Industry 4.0, Thales is by your side to build cybersecurity into the heart of your transformation.

After mechanisation, mass production and then computerisation, digital technologies are ushering in a new industrial revolution called Industry 4.0. With the Internet of Things, it’s now possible to fit machinery, processes and facilities with smart, interconnected sensors. The Cloud lets us store these vast quantities of data and make it available to the users and applications that need it, even on the move. And with recent advances in artificial intelligence and Big Data technologies, we can unlock the power of all this data and turn it into useful, actionable information.

The promises of an Industrial Revolution

All sectors of industry are in a vitally important race for innovation, which will have its winners and losers. Because in so many areas, the advent of Industry 4.0 promises:

  • Lower production costs by optimising processes, maintenance, operation planning and ways of working
  • New products and services with higher quality and built-in smart connectivity
  • Transformation of business models, based on a whole new approach to customer relationships

New paradigm, new risks

The more industry is connected, the more vulnerable it is to the risk of cyberattacks, because there are so many more ‘doors’ for hackers to find. They can target the connected devices that generate data, the networks that carry it, the servers that host it or the information systems that use it.

40% of industrial control systems were cyberattacked
in the first half of 2018 (Source: Kaspersky Lab)

In 2010, the Stuxnet worm caused substantial damage to Iran’s nuclear facilities. In 2012, the Shamoon virus disrupted the operations of oil company Saudi Aramco. In 2015, the BlackEnergy malware left 80,000 people in Ukraine without electricity. More recently, the WannaCry and NotPetya attacks had massive repercussions around the world. And the list continues to grow. Cyberattacks on industrial production facilities are no longer the preserve of agents supported by nation states. The necessary tools are readily available on the black market, and hackers have developed attack strategies that are executed in stages. One approach is to use conventional phishing techniques to attack the less secure peripheral targets, such as suppliers or operators, then gradually look for vulnerabilities and push closer to the core of the information system.

Thales: Industry 4.0 cybersecured by design

Because cybersecurity should never be an obstacle to progress, Thales helps customers secure their information systems and industrial facilities in a five-pronged approach:

  • Anticipate threats
    One of the keys to effective prevention is to build cybersecurity into systems natively from the design phase. Thales develops secure architectures for its customers and also works with manufacturers of SCADA (supervisory control and data acquisition) systems to offer solutions that are secured by design.
  • Fix legacy systems
    Industrial systems have long service lives, unlike digital technologies and cyberthreats, which evolve extremely rapidly. It’s crucial therefore to protect legacy systems, which weren’t necessarily designed to operate in the new digital environment.
  • Supervise systems
    Thales supervises the critical information systems of more than 130 customers, mainly through our network of five Cyber Security Operations Centres (CSOCs). These centres provide 24/7 security supervision and control services for customer networks and detect cyberthreats before they happen.
  • Prepare for attacks
    To help customers prepare for cyberattacks, Thales provides cyber training through our Cyberlab and other facilities. We also work with customers to draw up business continuity and cyber resilience plans, with preventive measures, backup systems, operations in degraded mode, etc.
  • Protect data
    Keeping data safe at each point in its creation, transmission, storage and use is an important component of the overall solution, with measures to authenticate access to connected devices, encrypt transfers and protect datalakes.

With Thales, cybersecurity becomes a real catalyst for innovation and a vital asset, enabling customers to minimise risks while fully seizing the opportunities offered by the digital revolution!

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