WHITE-PAPER - Best Practices on Cyber Security

By 2020 there will be nearly 30 billion IoT devices. The more devices, the bigger the threat to the internet at companies that have not taken appropriate cybersecurity measures to protect their devices.

The risk and solutions are shared by the manufacturer (OEM) and their customers.  There are best practices that both can take to strengthen security and mitigate risks.

In 2018, NEMA, published a white-paper called 'Cyber Hygienge Best Practices'  that "identifies a set of industry best practices and guidelines for electrical equipment and medical imaging manufacturers to raise their level of cybersecurity sophistication in their manufacturing facilities and engineering processes" - NEMA. 

DOWNLOAD AND READ THE WHITE-PAPER HERE:  NEMACPSP2-2018.pdf

This document addresses raising a customer’s level of cybersecurity by following seven fundamental principles:

  1. segmenting networks
  2. understanding data types and flows
  3. monitoring devices and systems
  4. user management
  5. hardening devices
  6. updating devices
  7. providing a recovery plan/escalation process

AN EASY SOLUTIONS FOR OEMs & THEIR CUSTOMERS:  Require default passwords to be changed before the device before it becomes operational

A common reason that IoT devices have been compromised is when default passwords aren't changed by customers.  Default passwords are typically used to permofrm initial commissioning of devices to simplify that process.  It is recommended to not only require default change, but to encourage customers against weak passwords as well.

Learn more from NEMA her: https://blog.nema.org/2019/10/01/practice-good-cyber-hygiene-habits/

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