Securing Industrial Control Systems

Manufacturing environments are complex. A single plant may include robotics, HMIs, engineering workstations, controllers, historians, legacy Windows machines, quality systems, remote access tools, vendor-managed appliances, and cloud-connected applications. Some environments may also include SCADA systems for centralized monitoring and control of production, utilities, facilities, or process systems.

These systems were not all designed for the same security model. Some are modern and cloud-connected. Others are decades old and cannot support modern endpoint tools, frequent patching, or active scanning.

CSOI helps unify secure access across this mixed environment by applying Zero Trust principles at the connection level. Instead of assuming that a device is trusted because it is on the network, CSOI helps define:

This matters because manufacturing cybersecurity is not just about protecting data. It is about protecting production, safety, quality, delivery timelines, intellectual property, and customer commitments.

Traditional network security often depends heavily on IP addresses, subnets, routing rules, firewall policies, and VPN access. In OT environments, those controls can become complex, brittle, and difficult to manage across plants, vendors, remote users, and legacy equipment.

CSOI takes a different approach with Identity-Defined Networking.

With identity-based connectivity, access policy can be tied to the identity of a user, device, workload, or service. This allows manufacturers to define which systems are allowed to communicate instead of granting broad access to entire network segments.

For manufacturing OT, this supports:

The result is a more controlled model where access is intentional, limited, and aligned to operational needs.

Attackers often begin by discovering what is visible. Exposed systems, open ports, remote access gateways, reachable OT assets, and misconfigured services can all provide the reconnaissance needed to move deeper into an environment.

CSOI leverages network cloaking so protected resources are not openly discoverable to unauthorized users or devices. Access is only available after identity and policy requirements are met.

For manufacturing, this is especially important because many critical systems cannot defend themselves. A legacy controller, HMI, engineering workstation, or production server may not support modern security agents, but it can still be protected by reducing who can see it, reach it, and communicate with it.

Network cloaking helps manufacturers:

This is a practical way to protect systems that must stay online but cannot always be modernized quickly.

Manufacturing networks often include systems with very different roles and risk levels. A vendor technician should not have broad plant-wide access. A remote employee should not have the same reach as an engineering workstation. A historian should not automatically create a path to controllers. A compromised corporate endpoint should not be able to move freely toward production assets.

CSOI enables microsegmentation so communication can be limited to approved pathways.

That helps manufacturers:

Instead of relying only on large network zones, manufacturers can create more precise access relationships between users, devices, and systems.

Remote vendor access is one of the most important security challenges in manufacturing. Vendors, integrators, maintenance contractors, OEMs, and support technicians often need access to specialized systems. Their access may be legitimate and necessary, but it can also create significant risk.

Common problems include:

The result is a more defensible remote access model: vendors get what they need, when they need it, and nothing more.

The risk is simple: a vendor may only need access to one machine, one HMI, one controller, or one support server, but the remote access architecture may place them on a network segment where other systems are reachable.

CSOI helps replace broad remote access patterns with controlled, encrypted, policy-defined access. Vendors can be granted access to the specific systems they support without being placed broadly inside the plant network.

With CSOI, manufacturers can make vendor access:

The reason CSOI is so relevant for manufacturing is that OT security cannot be treated like standard office IT.

In corporate environments, teams can often patch, reboot, replace, or reimage systems on a regular schedule. In OT, those options are constrained by production realities. A plant may depend on equipment that is 10, 15, or 25 years old. Some systems run proprietary software. Others rely on legacy protocols, unsupported operating systems, or vendor-managed applications that cannot be changed without risking production.

Even when a patch exists, applying it may require:

That makes the traditional perimeter model incomplete. Firewalls, VPNs, endpoint agents, and patch management may still play a role, but they do not solve the core OT problem: how do you protect critical systems that must keep running, even when they cannot fully protect themselves?

CSOI answers that challenge by placing identity, encryption, policy enforcement, segmentation, and access control around the systems that matter most.

IT/OT convergence is where much of the new manufacturing risk appears. Production data now moves from plant-floor equipment to historians, MES platforms, ERP systems, dashboards, analytics tools, and cloud environments. Vendors need remote diagnostics. Engineers need remote access. Corporate teams need operational data.

This improves efficiency, but it also creates new pathways into OT.

A compromised account, exposed remote access service, misconfigured VPN, infected laptop, or vulnerable third-party connection can become a route toward production systems. Once inside, flat networks and overly broad access rules can allow lateral movement toward high-impact operational assets.

CSOI helps manufacturers support connected operations without relying on broad implicit trust. It creates secure, policy-defined access between the systems that need to communicate while reducing unnecessary exposure across the rest of the environment.

Manufacturing cybersecurity programs are increasingly evaluated against recognized frameworks and standards. NIST Zero Trust guidance encourages organizations to move away from broad perimeter-based trust and toward identity, resource-level protection, and continuous policy enforcement. ISA/IEC 62443 provides cybersecurity guidance for industrial automation and control systems, including secure operations, risk management, segmentation, and lifecycle controls.

CSOI aligns with these goals by helping manufacturers enforce:

For manufacturing leaders, the goal is not compliance for compliance’s sake. The goal is to reduce operational risk while maintaining production continuity.

A practical Zero Trust strategy should begin with the highest-risk assets and access paths.

Manufacturers should:

For legacy systems, compensating controls are essential. That includes network cloaking, segmentation, encryption, identity-based access, strict allowlists, and visibility into approved communication paths.

Manufacturing networks are more connected, more exposed, and more dependent on remote access than ever before. Legacy ICS equipment cannot always be patched, downtime is not an option, and broad network trust creates unnecessary risk. CSOI helps manufacturers move to Zero Trust without rip-and-replace disruption, using identity-defined networking, network cloaking, encrypted access, and microsegmentation to protect the systems that keep production running. Let’s start the conversation.