ForeScout and Belden form industrial cybersecurity alliance

IoT security company ForeScout Technologies has announced it has teamed up with Belden to help organisations mitigate detrimental impacts to safety, quality and productivity in their industrial automation and control networks caused by cybersecurity events. Through this strategic partnership, ForeScout and Belden aim to deliver secure network access, comprehensive device visibility and dynamic network segmentation capabilities in industrial environments powered by Belden infrastructure.

ForeScout formed a strategic alliance with Belden companies Tripwire and Hirschmann to offer a solution for operational technology (OT) security. Research indicates that cybersecurity incidents in industrial control environments originate from multiple vectors, such as system vulnerabilities, network architecture loopholes, lack of network segmentation, and unsecured hardware and software configuration.

“The convergence of IT and OT is shepherding unforeseen levels of interconnectivity among business networks and industrial automation environments,” said Pedro Abreu, Chief Strategy Officer, ForeScout. “Because OT networks may no longer be air gapped, threats such as WannaCry and NotPetya that target traditional IT devices have caused immense collateral damage to OT and industrial environments. Through our strategic alliance and integrations with Belden and others, ForeScout is helping organisations elevate their security posture in critical infrastructure networks.”

Given the criticality of uptime and safety for industrial devices, they can be taken down for maintenance or patching only during finite maintenance windows, and it is not always possible to install security software or agents that can impact real-time performance. Belden customers can now leverage ForeScout’s active and passive discovery and profiling techniques in industrial environments to gain device insight without needing to take devices offline. They can also build and maintain an asset inventory of devices across ICS layers, ensure compliance with industry regulations and security standards, and make dynamic, policy-based decisions for network access control within industrial control networks.

“Industrial security continues to be a top priority and asset visibility is the first line of defence to prevent intrusions into the network,” said Dhrupad Trivedi, Executive Vice President and Chief Technology Officer of Belden and President of Tripwire. “By partnering, we further strengthen our Industrial Cybersecurity Suite to expand our asset detection and system hardening capabilities while introducing ForeScout’s network access control and segmentation capabilities to our IT and OT customers.”

Image credit: ©stock.adobe.com/au/Olivier Le Moal