Why cyber criminals target the manufacturing industry

Globally, the manufacturing industry is the third most targeted sector by cyber criminals. A recent report from manufacturing membership organisation EEF, highlighted both the increase in cyber attacks against the sector and the industry’s inability to manage or understand the risks that cyber presents. [1]

Manufacturers are an attractive target. All too often critical business functions are reliant on legacy machinery which is typically no longer supported. In short, their business is reliant on systems which were not designed to withstand today’s sophisticated attacks.

What’s more, the levels of intellectual property (IP) and sensitive information available offers a great reward for cyber criminals; predominantly for financial gain, but also competitive advantage. It’s the nature of what manufacturers do that makes them an attractive target and the way they operate that makes them vulnerable.

In the same EEF report, 48% of manufacturers reported a compromise, with around half suffering financial or operational loss. The same report highlighted that more than four in ten manufacturers are unprepared for cyber attacks and acknowledged they need cyber education to better understand the risk they face.

On the risk calculator, manufacturers are seen by adversaries as low effort with high return. Therefore it is imperative that manufacturers harden their infrastructure and operations to protect themselves from cyber attacks; implementing cyber security best practice is essential. However, cyber security can be costly and with so many options available, first determine whether or not you have a risk. Then identify how accountable and receptive you are.

Identify and manage cyber risk in 3 steps

Step 1 – What information do you hold?

The first thing for any business is to identify all of its information assets. Understand why you hold that data and with whom it may need to be shared. You also need to understand the business impact should that data be stolen, altered or made unavailable. Remember business impact is not just about financial loss, consider the consequences to your operational effectiveness as well as your reputation.

Step 2 – Whom does the information need protecting from?

The second stage of identifying risk is to understand who would seek to do you harm, your threat sources. You need to quantify the motivations and capabilities of all identified threat sources. Remember that threat sources can come from insiders, your supply chain, as well as the traditional ‘hacker’.

Step 3 – Identify and manage your vulnerabilities

For a threat source to compromise your systems they have to first exploit a vulnerability. A business needs to be able to manage its vulnerabilities and assess the effectiveness of its patch management programmes. The goal here is to keep your attack surface as low as possible, make yourself a difficult target so that you are a less attractive proposition to your potential attackers.

Measure your risk

If you have followed the above steps you should be in a good position to start to identify and quantify your cyber risk. In its most simplistic form:

Risk = Business Impact x Threat x Vulnerability

Based on the equation above, you can now look at the countermeasures you need to put in place to mitigate the risk. The advantage of good risk management is that it ensures those precautions (your IT spend) is appropriate and proportionate to the risk.

Comprehend what is the worst case scenario and have a clear plan of how you would overcome a cyber attack. Understand how important cyber security is to you, how much protection you need and how you are going to deliver it. Keep reminding yourself how much impact it could have on the business and your reputation should any of those risks be realised.

3 reasons why manufacturers need to invest in cyber security

There are many reasons why you should invest in quality cyber security. Here are three core benefits of why you need it; not only to be protected, but to stay ahead of the competition and allow business growth:

1. To reduce the likelihood of an attack taking place
2. To be able to demonstrate to clients and regulatory authorities that your security is sound and that any attempted attack was not successful
3. To reduce the overall cost of an attack by having the ability to detect, articulate precisely what data was compromised and react; thereby reducing damage and returning to a ‘business as normal’ state as quickly as possible

Without proactive action on cyber security, attacks are inevitable and you don’t want to find yourself learning how to deal with an attack whilst you are compromised. Being cyber aware will help you prevent, detect or respond professionally and effectively when a cyber attack occurs. Remember, a proactive approach and mentality is key when dealing with cyber threats.

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 Footnotes

^{[1] ‘Cyber Security for Manufacturing’: Industry report; EEF, The Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) and AIG (2018)}