Capitalizing on the new digital marketplace not only requires that organizations collect and process data, but that they also use that data to impact the bottom line. Much of that is achieved simply by serving up data on demand to consumers. But some of the rest is achieved by leveraging real-time data to impact things such as the manufacturing floor, inventory management, or fine-tuning production to meet shifts in demand. This requires connecting traditionally isolated operational technology (OT) networks with IT. In a commissioned study conducted by Forrester Consulting on behalf of Fortinet this past January 2018, 429 global decision-makers across a wide variety of industries, responsible for the security of their organization’s critical infrastructure, IP level protection, IoT, and/or SCADA, were asked about this convergence process and the security challenges they are facing. Nearly all companies have already begun at least a basic convergence of OT and IT. As these organizations begin to actively converge these environments, however, they are encountering issues related to integration and security that they may not be equipped to handle. IT teams have a tendency to just want to throw security technology at the network and call it good. But these networks can be very different, and what works well in one environment can have devastating consequences in the other.
Here’s an infographic depicting the main points of the study:
