The ongoing theme in industrial cybersecurity centers on two competing dynamics – the desire to expand our implementation of automation and Industry 4.0 technologies with the goal of using more and faster connections, along with the decision-making data each generates to improve the efficiency and quality of production.

However, these goals now need to be counter-balanced against the heightened risks that all these connections spawn, and the doors they can open for hackers looking to shut down, extort or steal data from manufacturers. 

In this episode, Joe Saunders, the CEO and Founder of RunSafe Security, offers his take on securing these connections and data, as well:

• The on-going challenges associated with memory-based vulnerabilities.
• Tactics for supporting legacy OT code and minimizing the potential disruptions that can accompany software upgrades.
• Addressing vulnerabilities at a "class" level, instead of the one-at-a-time "whack-a-mole" approach.
• Embracing CISA's secure-by-demand edicts.
• The balancing act of more connections without lowering the security posture.
• Warnings about China and other state-sponsored threat actors.

As a go-to podcast for our listeners, we want to help you align your brand with our expertise. By sponsoring our podcast, your brand will build trust, and your message will stand out to an audience searching for tools to assist their cybersecurity efforts.
Click Here to Become a Sponsor.

Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

To catch up on past episodes, you can go to Manufacturing.net, IEN.com or MBTmag.com. You can also check Security Breach out wherever you get your podcasts, including Apple, Amazon and Overcast.

If you have a cybersecurity story or topic that you’d like to have us explore on Security Breach, you can reach me at [email protected].

To download our latest report on industrial cybersecurity, The Industrial Sector’s New Battlefield, click here.

We’re back to discuss an all-too-familiar topic – ransomware.

Ironically enough, it seems the topics we describe in this manner become so familiar because we can’t figure out viable, long-term solutions. I think part of the challenge for industrial organizations dealing with ransomware is that we have to divide our energy and resources between prevention, detection and response. Any one of those is a challenge, but managing all three is daunting, and hackers know this. But so do the good guys - one of which is our guest for today’s episode. 

Listen as Jeff Krull, principal and leader of Baker Tilly’s cybersecurity practice discusses their Guide to Ransomware Prevention, as well as his thoughts on:

• The C-suite's growing appreciation of how cyberattacks are impacting profitability, which means cybersecurity has become more than just an IT issue.
• How more resources have made RaaS groups increasingly difficult to detect and stop.
• Paying vs. not paying the ransom.
• Why more cyber regulation is on the way.
• Manufacturing's lack of redundant assets is making it a more attractive target, but also fueling action around response and recovery plans.
• Why not everyone needs access to everything.

As a go-to podcast for our listeners, we want to help you align your brand with our expertise. By sponsoring our podcast, your brand will build trust, and your message will stand out to an audience searching for tools to assist their cybersecurity efforts.
Click Here to Become a Sponsor.

Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

To catch up on past episodes, you can go to Manufacturing.net, IEN.com or MBTmag.com. You can also check Security Breach out wherever you get your podcasts, including Apple, Amazon and Overcast.

If you have a cybersecurity story or topic that you’d like to have us explore on Security Breach, you can reach me at [email protected].

To download our latest report on industrial cybersecurity, The Industrial Sector’s New Battlefield, click here.

A smarter, well-funded hacker community means embracing basic, yet daunting cyber challenges.

In manufacturing, regardless of your role, avoiding downtime is an obvious priority, and one of the motivating factors driving investments in cybersecurity.

In working to mitigate potential DDoS attacks or malware drops, manufacturers are tapping into more resources in heightening their awareness of vulnerabilities and the associated remedies, which can include updating access protocols, applying patches and replacing old equipment and technology. 

The problem is that the solutions can actually contribute to the problem you were originally trying to avoid – downtime. 

Our guest for today’s episode looks to offer some solutions. Watch/listen as Gabe Dimeglio, VP of Global Security Services at Rimini Street, a leading provider of data security and managed services, offers his take on:

• Patching strategies that minimize downtime.
• Getting employees engaged in cybersecurity strategies.
• Ensuring buy-in from throughout the enterprise when security measures need to be implemented.
• The evolving nature of hacker skills and the volume of attacks they are able to launch.
• How nation states are developing an institutionalized approach to developing new and better-trained hackers.
• Placing a priority on visibility, inventory and segmentation tools.
• Why he's an advocate of better regulatory efforts, not necessarily more of them.
• The under-utilized resources available to constructing response plans.

As a go-to podcast for our listeners, we want to help you align your brand with our expertise. By sponsoring our podcast, your brand will build trust, and your message will stand out to an audience searching for tools to assist their cybersecurity efforts.
Click Here to Become a Sponsor.

Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

To catch up on past episodes, you can go to Manufacturing.net, IEN.com or MBTmag.com. You can also check Security Breach out wherever you get your podcasts, including Apple, Amazon and Overcast.

If you have a cybersecurity story or topic that you’d like to have us explore on Security Breach, you can reach me at [email protected].

To download our latest report on industrial cybersecurity, The Industrial Sector’s New Battlefield, click here.

Sophos recently reported that 65 percent of manufacturing and production organizations were hit by ransomware last year, which, unlike other sectors, is an increase. Overall, these attacks have increased by 41 percent for manufacturing since 2020. Additionally, the cybersecurity firm found that 44 percent of computers used in manufacturing have been impacted by a ransomware attack, and over half of these intrusions can be directly linked to malicious emails and compromised credentials. 

These findings help illustrate what we’ve known for years – hackers would rather log in than break in. And stopping these types of attacks requires starting with your front line defenses – the workforce. 

Our guest for today’s episode will look to offer some solutions for transitioning employees from a weak link to a key cybersecurity asset. Watch/listen as Shawn Waldman, CEO and Founder of Secure Cyber, a leading provider of secure network design solutions, discusses:

• Why he would give the industrial sector a low D when grading their ability to effectively communicate security processes and protocols.
• How to address those employees that continue to click on every link in their emails.
• Why cybersecurity should be treated like a trade.
• Understanding the difference between security tools and IT services.
• Implementing accountability without being overly punitive and rewarding employees for positive cybersecurity actions.
• The concerns he has about 5G and quantum decryption.
• Avoiding the AI "easy button".

As a go-to podcast for our listeners, we want to help you align your brand with our expertise. By sponsoring our podcast, your brand will build trust, and your message will stand out to an audience searching for tools to assist their cybersecurity efforts.
Click Here to Become a Sponsor.

Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

To catch up on past episodes, you can go to Manufacturing.net, IEN.com or MBTmag.com. You can also check Security Breach out wherever you get your podcasts, including Apple, Amazon and Overcast.

If you have a cybersecurity story or topic that you’d like to have us explore on Security Breach, you can reach me at [email protected].

To download our latest report on industrial cybersecurity, The Industrial Sector’s New Battlefield, click here.

I recently watched an interesting documentary called Turning Point: The Bomb and the Cold War on Netflix. Great watch – I’d highly recommend it. Essentially it positioned nearly every prominent geo-political event since World War II as fallout from the U.S. dropping the nuclear bomb on Japan to end World War II.

Similarly, we can look at a number of recent, major cybersecurity events that have their origins in attacks on critical infrastructure. Whether you want to go all the way back to Stuxnet, or more recent developments like Colonial Pipeline, hackers realized that the control systems utilized in these environments mirror those used by manufacturers like Boeing, Clorox, Johnson Controls and many others who have been recent victims of high-profile hacks.

Joining me to discuss these dynamics is Bill Moore, the founder and CEO of XONA Systems, a leading provider of secure access solutions. Watch/listen as he dives into:

• The challenges of updating and securing the legacy tech found throughout manufacturing and critical infrastructure.
• Getting past the 'set it and forget it' mindset of industrial cybersecurity.
• Strategies for implementing updates and patches without slowing operations or opening new doors to hackers.
• Ways to improve funding processes to ensure security needs are met and keep pace with an evolving threat landscape.
• How the more distributed dynamic of OT technology needs to be understood in developing new strategies and implementing new tools.
• Lessons learned from Colonial Pipeline.
• Ways to optimize regulatory efforts.
• Why every industrial organization needs a dedicated Director of OT Security.

As a go-to podcast for our listeners, we want to help you align your brand with our expertise. By sponsoring our podcast, your brand will build trust, and your message will stand out to an audience searching for tools to assist their cybersecurity efforts.
Click Here to Become a Sponsor.

Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

To catch up on past episodes, you can go to Manufacturing.net, IEN.com or MBTmag.com. You can also check Security Breach out wherever you get your podcasts, including Apple, Amazon and Overcast.

If you have a cybersecurity story or topic that you’d like to have us explore on Security Breach, you can reach me at [email protected].

To download our latest report on industrial cybersecurity, The Industrial Sector’s New Battlefield, click here.

When I was a kid, we always looked forward to my dad’s work picnic. He was a tool and dye maker for a leading caster manufacturer that would rent out a local park, make a ton of food and put on various games and activities for the families. One of the highlights of this day was a softball game pitting the office versus the shop.

The good-natured shots that were fired across the dugouts of this summer classic reminds me of the challenges we see in industrial cybersecurity when it comes to bringing OT and IT teams together. While great strides have been made and numerous lessons learned on why these groups need to sync up, the reality is that we still have a long way to go. 

Over the last couple of months we’ve had some interesting takes on how to realize this need, so let’s revisit the following thoughts on the IT-OT working relationship from:

• Kris Lovejoy, Global Security and Resilience Leader at Kyndryl.
• John Cusimano, VP of OT Security at Armexa.
• Josh Williams, Strategic Account Manager at IriusRisk.
• Rod Locke, director of project management at Fortinet. 

Our guests have also weighed in on some of the more challenging dynamics of improving the IT-OT relationship. These have included:

• Brian Deken, Commercial Manager of Cybersecurity Services at Rockwell Automation.
• Riley Groves, an engineer from Auvesy-MDT.
• Theo Zafirakos, Cyber Risk and Information Security Expert at Fortra.

As a go-to podcast for our listeners, we want to help you align your brand with our expertise. By sponsoring our podcast, your brand will build trust, and your message will stand out to an audience searching for tools to assist their cybersecurity efforts.
Click Here to Become a Sponsor.

To catch up on past episodes, you can go to Manufacturing.net, IEN.com or MBTmag.com. You can also check Security Breach out wherever you get your podcasts, including Apple, Amazon and Overcast.

If you have a cybersecurity story or topic that you’d like to have us explore on Security Breach, you can reach me at [email protected].

To download our latest report on industrial cybersecurity, The Industrial Sector’s New Battlefield, click here.

An ethical cyber researcher breaks down the 'tsunami of exposed data' he continues to uncover.

When it comes to solving industrial cybersecurity's biggest challenges, I think we have to continue to ask questions that simultaneously tackle basic blocking and tackling concerns, as well as those that lead to bad news. Both prevent us from putting our heads in the sand in trying to ignore the shortcomings of our current strategies, and I’d argue that a great deal of positive outcomes couldn’t be realized without repeatedly asking questions and not being afraid of the potential findings. 

I also think our guest for this episode would agree. It’s our pleasure to welcome Jeremiah Fowler to Security Breach. He’s a leading cybersecurity researcher who has a wealth of knowledge on the industrial threat landscape, and recently uncovered a data vulnerability exposing 769 million personal records and 380,000 email addresses. Left unaddressed, this could have had highly damaging impacts on a global scale.

Watch/listen as Jeremiah shares his thoughts on:

• The need to educate the C-Suite on risk, the real-world costs of cybersecurity shortcomings, and how you can't measure the loss of trust.
• Why the human factor will always be the weakest link.
• How nearly every issue in cybersecurity comes back to visibility.
• The new challenges AI will continue to create.
• The increasing threat stemming from new credential harvesting schemes that clone login pages.
• The unintentional backdoor vulnerabilities created by legacy systems.
• Why he misses the Golden Age of Bug Bounties.
• The value of placing time limits on access to sensitive data.

As a go-to podcast for our listeners, we want to help you align your brand with our expertise. By sponsoring our podcast, your brand will build trust, and your message will stand out to an audience searching for tools to assist their cybersecurity efforts.
Click Here to Become a Sponsor.

Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

To catch up on past episodes, you can go to Manufacturing.net, IEN.com or MBTmag.com. You can also check Security Breach out wherever you get your podcasts, including Apple, Amazon and Overcast.

If you have a cybersecurity story or topic that you’d like to have us explore on Security Breach, you can reach me at [email protected].

To download our latest report on industrial cybersecurity, The Industrial Sector’s New Battlefield, click here.

The landscape of industrial cybersecurity continues to change and evolve, and demands a vigilant monitoring of the next threat, vulnerability or potential soft spot in our defenses. That’s why we continue to produce Security Breach, and, by the way, continue to be so appreciative of the growth and support we’ve received from each of you.

That said, once in a while it’s good to take a look back at some of the ongoing lessons that we’re learning, especially when the input from our guests offers such an interesting range of responses.

So, let’s hear from a collection of previous guests as they reflect on the challenges and opportunities of more connection points, and how they responded to the question – are we over-connected?

• Joel Burleson-Davis, SVP of Cyber Engineering at Imprivata
• Josh Williams, Strategic Account Manager at IriusRisk
• Roman Arutyunov, Co-founder of Xage Security
• Kris Lovejoy, Global Security and Resilience Leader at Kyndryl
• Roland Cozzolino, CTO/CIO of InsightCyber
• Sharon Brizinov, Director of Research at Claroty’s research arm, Team82

As a go-to podcast for our listeners, we want to help you align your brand with our expertise. By sponsoring our podcast, your brand will build trust, and your message will stand out to an audience searching for tools to assist their cybersecurity efforts.
Click Here to Become a Sponsor.

To catch up on past episodes, you can go to Manufacturing.net, IEN.com or MBTmag.com. You can also check Security Breach out wherever you get your podcasts, including Apple, Amazon and Overcast.

If you have a cybersecurity story or topic that you’d like to have us explore on Security Breach, you can reach me at [email protected].

To download our latest report on industrial cybersecurity, The Industrial Sector’s New Battlefield, click here.

According to IBM’s Cost of a Data Breach Report, nearly 20 percent of the organizations surveyed stated that they have experienced a breach stemming from a compromise in their supply chain, or a vulnerability related to it. The average cost of these breaches was estimated at just under $4.5 million. Their data also found that attacks emanating from the supply chain had a longer lifecycle than average.

The increased costs and complexities of addressing supply chain attacks is not a surprise when you consider that these intrusions not only impact the targeted company, but the logistics, distribution and retail elements that are dragged along on this difficult and painful ride. To help dive into the factors associated with supply chain attacks and other cybersecurity challenges, we welcome Theo Zafirakos, a Cyber Risk and Information Security Expert at Fortra to the show.

Watch/listen as we discuss:

• The three primary soft spots from which supply chain hacks emanate - software, devices and people.
• Why people are the most neglected of the three, and how they can be trained to identify attacks.
• The expanded role AI is playing in email compromises that help fuel supply chain attacks.
• Why IT and OT need to become more aware of each other's requirements and risks.
• The important role cybersecurity plays in ensuring operational reliability.
• The growing need for ransomware response plans, and how a national supply chain hack helped reinforce this need for all enterprises, regardless of size or sector.

As a go-to podcast for our listeners, we want to help you align your brand with our expertise. By sponsoring our podcast, your brand will build trust, and your message will stand out to an audience searching for tools to assist their cybersecurity efforts.
Click Here to Become a Sponsor.

Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

To catch up on past episodes, you can go to Manufacturing.net, IEN.com or MBTmag.com. You can also check Security Breach out wherever you get your podcasts, including Apple, Amazon and Overcast.

If you have a cybersecurity story or topic that you’d like to have us explore on Security Breach, you can reach me at [email protected].

To download our latest report on industrial cybersecurity, The Industrial Sector’s New Battlefield, click here.

Due to the rise in attacks on manufacturing and critical infrastructure, and the devasting impacts these attacks have on daily lives around the world, the World Economic Form recently unveiled a report entitled Building a Culture of Cyber Resilience in Manufacturing. 

This initiative not only identified the sector’s primary challenges for developing a culture of cyber resilience, but also formulated three guiding principles for establishing an enduring strategy. They revolve around people, processes and culture.

I was fortunate enough to have one of the key contributors to the creation of these strategies sit down with me for some unique takes on the biggest challenges facing industrial cybersecurity. Watch/listen to my conversation with Kris Lovejoy, Global Security and Resilience Leader at Kyndryl, a leader in cyber resiliency strategies and services, as we discuss:

• How the capital investment process utilized throughout manufacturing could be leaving several key players behind, and the negative impacts this could have on the entire sector.
• Why security is not a tool, but a process.
• The ongoing issues associated with asset inventory and the first steps to take in correcting this issue.
• The Trojan Horse dynamic that smaller enterprises need to embrace in order to improve their security posture.
• How to know if you're the biggest risk or weakest link in a production environment or supply chain.
• Why regulatory efforts focused on cybersecurity could dramatically change the composition of the industrial sector.
• The difference between moving to the cloud and securely moving to cloud platforms.
• How security should be a driver of digital transformation strategies.

As a go-to podcast for our listeners, we want to help you align your brand with our expertise. By sponsoring our podcast, your brand will build trust, and your message will stand out to an audience searching for tools to assist their cybersecurity efforts.
Click Here to Become a Sponsor.

Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify

To catch up on past episodes, you can go to Manufacturing.net, IEN.com or MBTmag.com. You can also check Security Breach out wherever you get your podcasts, including Apple, Amazon and Overcast.

If you have a cybersecurity story or topic that you’d like to have us explore on Security Breach, you can reach me at [email protected].

To download our latest report on industrial cybersecurity, The Industrial Sector’s New Battlefield, click here.