{"id":1195,"date":"2017-09-01T05:00:05","date_gmt":"2017-09-01T03:00:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/staging.blogs.yokogawa.de\/chemical-pharma\/uncategorized\/intrusion-via-remote-access\/"},"modified":"2022-06-17T09:28:05","modified_gmt":"2022-06-17T07:28:05","slug":"intrusion-via-remote-access","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.yokogawa.com\/eu\/blog\/chemical-pharma\/en\/intrusion-via-remote-access\/","title":{"rendered":"Intrusion via remote access"},"content":{"rendered":"

Science fiction has long become science fact<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Only a few years ago, I would have dismissed it as impossible or reminiscent of a wacky science fiction film: managers who control and monitor their plant by remote access \u2013 from the comfort of their armchair, as it were, or wherever else they happen to be.<\/p>\n

Today, scenarios like this are almost an established standard. The ability to maintain a process plant remotely is not so much expected as demanded. In the modern digital age, remote maintenance has become the norm and indeed life would be unthinkable without it.<\/p>\n

Every now and then, however, those managers can\u2019t help wondering whether their own plant might conceivably be at risk from\u2026<\/p>\n

\u201cComputer viruses, hacker attacks, espionage or sabotage…. Many people have reservations about transferring data over the Internet for this very reason. Operators of IT facilities that are integrated with production, for example safety instrumented or process control systems, tend to take a particularly critical view. Yet it is in this kind of sensitive environment that secure solutions can have enormous benefits. Remote monitoring, diagnostics and maintenance of automation systems in the process industry can result in a set of advantages both for the plant owner and for the service partner: faster response times including predictive activities help maximize plant availability while the reduced time and personnel costs per incident enable better services to be offered at a cheaper price. The growing significance of this service model is confirmed by the fact that as long ago as 2011 Namur defined fundamental conditions and requirements for plant owners in Worksheet 135. IT security aspects also play an important role, of course (see <\/em>NAMUR Worksheet 115<\/em><\/a>, in German).\u201d (Source: <\/em>Article in “Chemie Technik<\/em><\/a>, Issue 4\/2014, in German)<\/em><\/p>\n

So where do things stand at present with regard to IT security? Is it even possible to protect \u201cremote accesses\u201d from hackers or other forms of attack?<\/p>\n

According to the BSI brochure \u201cIndustrial Control System Security\u201d<\/a> (in German) published by the German Federal Office for Information Security, \u201cintrusion via remote access\u201d is number 4 in the list of top threats (source: BSI<\/a>).<\/p>\n

Remote services<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Yokogawa has been offering remote maintenance concepts under the heading \u201cRemote Services\u201d for years now. Our remote service functionality starts with<\/em><\/p>\n