All too often, "information security" only refers to the office-based IT systems. In these areas, protection goals such as confidentiality and integrity have a very high priority. Functional limitations, such as network failures, network problems such as jitter or interference with VoIP connections, or general errors in image transmission in video conferences, on the other hand, are more likely to be tolerated.

In the industrial sector, in particular with automation systems that communicate via "real-time protocols", network failures or the aforementioned jitter can quickly lead to malfunctions or damage to the equipment. In the worst case, this may endanger personnel – for example, if signals do not arrive on time. Therefore, as a protection goal, availability has a very high priority in OT environments. Besides availability, integrity is also very important. If the signals for setpoints and real values were to be swapped via a manipulation, this would prove just as catastrophic as a failure! In order to ensure these protection goals, the security of the components used, as well as their correct configuration and the structure of the networks, must not be ignored.

Fig. Comparison of priorities in the fields of IT (left) and OT (right)

Furthermore, when using antivirus, firewall or deep-packet inspection solutions in OT networks, care must be taken (through appropriate configurations) to ensure that latencies as well as resource consumption do not negatively affect the operation of the system.

Therefore, the technical protection and security measures from classic office IT cannot be mapped directly 1:1 to the industrial sector.