Book Image

IoT and OT Security Handbook

By : Smita Jain, Vasantha Lakshmi
Book Image

IoT and OT Security Handbook

By: Smita Jain, Vasantha Lakshmi

Overview of this book

The Fourth Industrial Revolution, or Industry 4.0, is all about digital transformation, manufacturing, and production. The connected world we live in today, including industries, comes with several cybersecurity challenges that need immediate attention. This book takes you through the basics of IoT and OT architecture and helps you understand and mitigate these security challenges. The book begins with an overview of the challenges faced in managing and securing IoT and OT devices in Industry 4.0. You’ll then get to grips with the Purdue model of reference architecture, which will help you explore common cyber attacks in IoT and OT environments. As you progress, you’ll be introduced to Microsoft Defender for IoT and understand its capabilities in securing IoT and OT environments. Finally, you will discover best practices for achieving continuous monitoring and vulnerability management, as well as threat monitoring and hunting, and find out how to align your business model toward zero trust. By the end of this security book, you’ll be equipped with the knowledge and skills to efficiently secure IoT and OT environments using Microsoft Defender for IoT.
Table of Contents (16 chapters)
1
Part 1: Understand the Challenges in IoT/OT Security and Common Attacks
5
Part 2: How Microsoft Defender for IoT Can Address the Open Challenges in the Connected World We Live in Today
9
Part 3: Best Practices to Achieve Continuous Monitoring, Vulnerability Management, Threat Monitoring and Hunting, and to Align the Business Model Toward Zero Trust
12
Chapter 9: Vulnerability Management and Threat Monitoring

Why do we see frequent attacks on the OT/IoT environment?

To unearth the truth regarding why IoT and OT are being attacked more now, let us understand the underlying cause that has left systems more vulnerable and attack-prone.

Diminishing airgap

A disconnected network is a type of network security that was leveraged in organizations in the past. This type of disconnected network is called an airgapped network.

An airgap was never a complete security solution, but network segmentation did pose a few challenges to the attacker.

OT networks were never completely airgapped. A vendor connecting their laptop to an OT network with a dongle connected to it for internet access. Remotely upgrading Industrial Control Systems (ICS) or remote firmware was all happening without knowing about these malpractices. IT/OT convergence increased the attack surface drastically and opened a new attack path.

Fully automated plants further encouraged businesses to utilize AI and ML to further...