New Deloitte Study Identifies Cyber Vulnerabilities in Manufacturing Supply Chains

A new study conducted by Deloitte confirms what many supply chain managers have long suspected: Cyber breaches are on the rise for major companies.

According to Deloitte, the U.S. manufacturing sector is “woefully unprepared”for the cyber threats associated with new connected technology. In “Industry 4.0 and cyber risk: Security in an age of connected production,” one-third of all manufacturers sampled admitted to not having performed any cyber risk assessments of the industrial connected devices operating on factory floors.

René Waslo, a cyber risk principal with Deloitte, says that in the age of “Industry 4.0,” we're only beginning to understand the power that connected devices will have over our lives.

“The financial services and life sciences sectors are probably the most refined in their understanding on how to protect the attack surface,” she says, “but other industries must quickly come up to speed.”

The new Deloitte study outlines the strategies that businesses must take to build cybersecurity efforts into their larger business plan and untimely protect their operations and their customers.

“Even in an era when companies may anticipate less regulatory oversight, the incentives for protecting brand by fully identifying threat vectors is obvious,” she adds.

Key insights on some of the most significant cyber challenges manufacturers must address include:

• Evolution of Cyber Risks from I3.0 to I4.0 – New cyber threats facing Industry 4.0 have built upon common Industry 3.0 attacks with malicious marketing campaigns, disruption of service attacks using botnets and privacy breaches, including the compromise of sensitive customer data and trade secrets, becoming top concerns.
• More IoT Devices Equals More Vulnerabilities – Over 20 billion IoT devices are expected to be deployed around the world by 2020, with many of these devices being used in manufacturing facilities and production lines. As these devices are integrated further, manufacturers will need to implement their own safeguards and security practices to protect their operations and those that they depend on from third-parties.
• Learnings From Other Industries Need to be Leveraged – As manufacturing has been behind the curve in adopting connected technology compared to other industries, learnings from other sectors like financial services should be incorporated into manufacturing strategies.

Finally, Deloitte believes new technologies like blockchain have the potential to help mitigate current cybersecurity risks by streamlining the flow of goods and information.

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