All About SCADA Systems

Mission vital  Systems for the Energy Industry

Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) techniques that pick up and manage data across a large facility from a central computer system, play a serious role in the utility industry, supporting to manage large and diverse information loads from power plants of all types. Interconnectivity has made such systems increasingly vulnerable to cyber attacks.

The Growing Vulnerability of SCADA Control Systems

The control methods for the electric grid used to work in a stand-alone environment without laptop or computer  or communication links to an external  data  Technology (IT) infrastructure. Over the past fifteen yrs such stand-alone enclaves have been increasingly connected to both the corporate environment and the external world, and the utility SCADA methods are no exception. computer system and communication network interconnection brings with it the probable for cyber attacks on these techniques by adversaries. This is a essential  challenge since this sort of attack can affect  various  agencies across the country simultaneously. Such attacks get the enhanced possible to lead to a cascading negative effect to the Bulk Power System.

SCADA Control System Threats Are More Vulnerable Than ever before

SCADA methods are coming in line with regular  networking technologies. The present generation of SCADA security is increasingly utilizing open system architecture to distribute functionality across a wide-area network (WAN) for communication between the master station and communications equipment. SCADA systems are becoming ubiquitous. Thin clients, web portals, and web based merchandise are gaining popularity with virtually all major companies. The increased convenience of end end users viewing their processes remotely introduces protection considerations resulting in SCADA-based techniques being vulnerable to cyber-attacks. The mission-critical nature of a large amount of SCADA systems makes them targets of cyber-terrorist. In a worst case scenario, failure of a SCADA system could result in massive economic losses through loss of data or actual physical destruction, misuse or theft, even loss of life, either directly or indirectly. SCADA systems no longer have the benefit of security-through obscurity that may have existed during the past from the utilization of specialized protocols and proprietary interfaces. Increasingly, SCADA networks are being connected to the net. Similar to other networked technologies, SCADA networks must have physical, administrative, and technical safety safeguards. Security and authentication in designing, deploying, and working SCADA networks is paramount. For instance, protection gadgets for example  IPS/IDS, firewalls, and other technological protection measures need to be deployed to help protect SCADA systems. Automated security info management solutions  are needed to help consolidate the safety logs across the SCADA system wide-area network. Also see industrial network security and industrial networking solutions