Cyber Defense eMagazine May Edition for 2022

Device hardening
Many of these devices operate in an environment of a customized special purpose hardware and software
platform. The platform’s operating system is typically a stripped-down popular OS such as Windows or
Linux. The underlying assumption is that such devices, corresponding platform, and the application will
operate in a closed environment and do not need to be hardened for full security, as offered by a nonstripped
standard OS. Lack of hardening is a risk that the modern-day attackers understand well and
have figured out how to leverage.
The other dimension to the security risk is the outdated OS such as Windows 95, NT, Windows 7, XP or
similar older versions of Linux. The lack of upgrade to these OS from the OEM and lack of connectivity
from these devices to the OEM adds to the hardening risk.
The third dimension to the security risk is the arcane but field proven utilities. Based on their age and the
design parameters for security, the risk should be assessed. Some of the obvious insecure utilities use
unencrypted data such as ftp and sh instead of sftp and ssh.
IoT management
Information Technology (IT) is traditionally known as the technology that deals with information to make
decisions to operate and protect its own infrastructure. In the world of IoTs the Operational Technology
(OT) is employed and architected along with IT.
OT is used to monitor and control the IoT/IIoT devices through a good understanding of the device which
generates events and takes appropriate actions based on the generated event. OT operations on its own
with no other outside connection is generally quite safe. However, IT and OT are inherently
interconnected making it easier to pass inherent risks and benefits of each architecture to the combined
infrastructure. OT acts as a bridge that increases the security risk to the IoT/IIoT infrastructure through
expanded connectivity to the attackers. IT is traditionally more agile and less rigorous, requiring much
more sophisticated security risk management. OT is inherently different on both fronts, the agility and
rigor adding significant security risk while facilitating easier operations.
To get a sense of heightened security risks, a Kaspersky analysis of its telemetry from honeypots in the
1st half of 2021, more than 1.5 billion IoT attacks were detected during the period. These were up from
639 million during the previous half. The rate of growth of attacks on the IoT/IIoT devices and the
infrastructure has more than doubled causing increased attention to the security.
Dated data management
Information Technology is considered data centric whereas Operations Technology is considered
management oriented. This is a good functional description and de-emphasizes the importance of data
in Operations Technology. Most cyber security attacks are centered around the data and lack of emphasis
on data in Operation Technology is fundamentally a risk.
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