Keysight Technologies, on Tuesday announced a new series of Industrial Visibility solutions, which include a network packet broker and taps that enable electric utilities to meet North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) Critical Infrastructure Protection (CIP) monitoring requirements.
Operational technology (OT) systems, including industrial and control systems (ICS) that support the core operation of utilities, gas, oil and critical manufacturing companies, are targets for cyberattacks. Ransomware, extortion, and financially motivated cybercrimes top the list of threat vectors that concern respondents according to the SANS 2021 ICS Survey Report issued by the SANS Institute.
Keysight’s new Industrial Visibility solutions enable industrial asset operators and owners to monitor their IT and OT infrastructure for threats while meeting NERC CIP security standards and similar regulations for high-voltage electric transmission and power generation. These standards, including CIP-005, CIP-007, CIP-008, and CIP-010, require utilities to collect and archive network traffic at the plant and substation level.
Keysight’s Tough Taps and Vision T1000 meet extended temperature ranges, withstand shock and vibration, and have optimized copper and fiber 10/100, 1G and 10G ports. In addition, these products have been certified for the International of Electrical and Electronics Engineers standards IEEE1613 for safety and IEC 61850 for communication protocols for intelligent electrical devices.
Taran Singh, VP, Enterprise Solutions at Keysight Technologies
OT networks are increasingly interconnected with IT networks expanding the OT attack surface. As cybersecurity attacks escalate against critical infrastructures, industrial operators, such as electric utilities, need technology to monitor the cybersecurity of both their OT and IT environments.
