IoT Security: The Latest Addition to The Manufacturer’s Quiver
Industry 4.0 or the fourth Industrial Revolution became a reality today owing to the latest entrant on the manufacturing scene, Internet of Things.
A ‘smart factory’ is connected to supply chain networks; the data flow from the machines and the factory to the cloud. This enables synchronized and united control in all aspects of manufacturing, offering an easier, smarter, more productive and more prosperous manufacturing processes lifecycle, with real-time information and real-time management.
However, the increasing usage of the internet also has its vices, particularly in the form of online security. These smart manufacturing units, now face threats and vulnerabilities of a data breach, corruption, data stealth along with Trojans, water holes etc in the supply chain infrastructure.
How IoT security saves the day?
Stopping or reducing usage of the IoT framework is a non-option. Following methods are the panacea that manufacturers of today have for these threats:
- Security by Design
When we add security measures into application programs, it is known as security by design. It strengthens embedded systems and single applications and enables them to resist attempts at reverse engineering, malware insertion and/or tampering. Eg. prplSecurity.
- Threat Detection using Machine Learning
If all production processes which use IoT could detect threats on their own, it would make the system immensely stronger and that is exactly what machine learning does. However, the addition of these algorithms does add a performance overhead to the system as a whole.
A secure IoT structure is the foundation of a strong smart manufacturing system and the recent developments are on the right course if not already there.
