The Oldsmar Florida water treatment plant attack recently made national news when it disclosed that an attacker had attempted to taint the city water supply. While not all details have been made public, early indications suggest that a remote access application allowed the attacker to control the treatment plant’s SCADA computer. Though these types of attacks are not new, the Oldsmar incident has once again put a spotlight on the security of remote access to SCADA systems.
As everyone in the industry knows, remote access is a reality in modern SCADA systems. Remote access provides operators the ability to monitor and control critical systems with limited staff from anywhere, at any time. Simply disabling remote access on these systems is not a practical option. Yet the problem remains that many of traditional SCADA systems were not built with the necessary security in mind to combat modern threats. That’s where MetroCloud can help.
MetroCloud was built to be different. With MetroCloud there is no SCADA computer sitting on a desk in a treatment plant that is subject to power outages, equipment failure, flooding, or any number of physical threats. MetroCloud lives in the cloud and was designed with redundant, secure remote access from its inception by a company with decades of experience in SCADA. To protect our customers from unauthorized access, MetroCloud uses a multi-layered defense-in-depth approach to remote access that ensures no single compromised set of credentials will give an attacker access to your critical systems. Here are just a few of the security controls that MetroCloud employs:
- Available Multi-Factor authentication that takes security beyond simple username and password credentials.
- Password protected VPN Access from PC and Mobile Devices.
- SCADA application access credentials specific to your users provides security and accountability.
- Lock Codes for PLCs and RTUS to protect sensitive system settings.
While cyberattacks on critical water and wastewater infrastructures remain an unfortunate reality, MetroCloud has been designed not only to keep you safe today, it has been built on a platform that can evolve to continue to keep your systems secure in the future. Even with a system as capable and secure as MetroCloud, system security is only as good as the weakest link. That is why design collaboration, proper system configuration, regular maintenance, and thorough operator training are all necessary links in the security chain.
The team at Metropolitan Industries – and our 60 plus years of experience in telemetry and SCADA – is here to help. Contact us today for a consultation on your current SCADA system. Together, we can ensure that we are doing our part in the continued preservation of our water supply.