A group of cybersecurity leaders have come together to launch the Operational Technology Cybersecurity Coalition. Founding members include Claroty, Forescout, Honeywell, Nozomi Networks and Tenable, each with significant experience in building, protecting and defending industrial control systems and critical infrastructure assets.
According to a statement, the OT Cyber Coalition aims to advocate for vendor-neutral, interoperable and standards-based cybersecurity solutions, and works collaboratively with industry and government stakeholders on how to best deploy data-sharing solutions that enhance collective defence.
These efforts support the notion that competitive solutions promote innovation and strengthen overall security.
On the whole, the OT Cyber Coalition represents a broad spectrum of people, processes and technology, and offers perspective on the best practices applicable across the entire OT lifecycle.
Spokespeople from the founding members group commented on the announcement.
Claroty chief product officer - CISO Grant Geyer says, “Given the significant exposure, a more dangerous set of threat actors, and the risks to national security and society, the government needs to leverage all cyber capabilities at its disposal to protect critical infrastructure.
"No one entity or provider has a monopoly on protecting critical infrastructure, and a vendor-neutral and open standards approach can ensure that we're all working in concert to keep the country safe.
Forescout VP of threat defence Shawn Taylor says, “Our combined customer base represents the largest and most impactful organisations in critical infrastructure. We have the potential to collect asset information, vulnerability data, threats and security incidents, and risk status to provide real time insight and data to help support government, asset owners and operators as part of our collective defence mission.
Honeywell Connected Enterprise vice president and general manager of OT cyber security Jeff Zindel says, “Although we may be a group of competitive OT cybersecurity companies, we also are extremely passionate about working collaboratively to improve the cybersecurity of these sometimes-fragile OT environments. This work is essential to protect our country's critical infrastructure.
Tenable vice president operational technology security Marty Edwards says, “Our companies represent the entire OT lifecycle, and can be leveraged strategically in an advisory capacity and by critical infrastructure operators to protect themselves and improve our national preparedness. We look forward to working together to promote these goals.
Nozomi Networks co-founder and CPO Andrea Carcano says, “To combat the growing number of threats against our critical infrastructure, it is essential that the cybersecurity industry embrace competitive innovation and open information sharing to collectively strengthen defences. As a founding member of the coalition, we look forward to helping advance these key priorities to fortify the security of our nation's most critical infrastructure.
Nozomi Networks CEO Edgard Capdevielle added that he believes the only way to combat the growing number of threats against our critical infrastructure is to embrace competitive innovation and open information sharing, across industry and with government.
He says, “That includes cybersecurity options that never compromise privacy, and make it possible for public and private sectors organisations to strengthen trust and collective defence mechanisms.
"We also believe that vendor-specific sharing and closed solutions diminish the versatile nature of intelligence required to improve the cybersecurity posture of operators of critical infrastructure."
Capdevielle concludes, “OT Cyber Coalition members are leveraging their combined centuries of experience in building, operating, protecting, and defending our nation's industrial control systems and critical infrastructure to help accelerate public–private sector efforts."