The Risk and Reward of Distributed Industrial Control
Examines how remote monitoring in distributed energy resources expands industrial attack surfaces, drawing lessons from the 2022 ViaSat attack.
Summary
Distributed Operations in Industrial Assets
Economic efficiencies and automation have led operators of distributed energy resources (DERs), pipelines, and wind farms to rely heavily on unmanned remote control over public and satellite networks.
Expanding the Attack Surface
Transitioning from isolated facilities to distributed network architectures exposes critical physical assets to remote cyber exploitation and disruption.
Case Studies in Communication Link Interruption
Analyzing historical adversary campaigns, including the 2022 ViaSat satellite communications compromise and pipeline intrusions, highlights how fragile communication channels can be exploited.
Sensible Risk Mitigation Strategies
Securing distributed industrial operations requires cost-effective architectural hardening, robust encryption, and out-of-band monitoring without requiring cost-prohibitive dedicated fiber networks.
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