Electricity + Control February 2019

NOT TO BE MISSED

Safety Earthing, Bonding & Lightning Protection of Electrical/Electronic Systems and Equipment 28 & 29 March 2019, Premier Conferencing Centre, Glenanda, Johannesburg This two-day course/workshop, based on the applicable SANS, IEEE & IEC standards, is aimed at equipping delegates with in-depth knowledge of the purposes and various methods of electrical system earthing, bonding and lightning protection system design, implementation, maintenance and testing. Enquiries: Tel. +27 (0) 11 626 9000 or email bookings@premierconferencing.co.za IS3 X-Change User Conference 17-20 March 2019, Sun City, North-West Province The sessions and workshops of Africa's largest Industrial Software Conference are designed to demonstrate how Edge to Enterprise transforms business processes and the entire value chain to align with business goals. Enquiries: Visit www.x-change.co.za Power & Electricity World Africa 26-27 March 2019, Sandton Convention Centre, Johannesburg The largest and longest running power and electricity conference and exhibition in Africa will again be hosting utilities, large energy users, government, regulators and municipalities among other industry decision makers and buyers. Enquiries: Visit https://www.terrapinn.com/ exhibition/power-electricity-world-africa/ index.stm Africa Automation Fair 4-6 June 2019, Ticketpro Dome, Johannesburg Africa Automation Fair will host the second edition of the Connected Industries Conference in line with growing international focus on Industry 4.0 and the advanced connected industries of the future. Enquiries: Tel. +27 (0) 11 549 8300 or email info@africaautomationfair.com CSIR International Convention Centre, Pretoria Future-Proof: Engineering is shaping what the future will look like and is evolving as quickly as technology itself. This conference will explore whether your business, ideas, products and jobs are future-proof. Enquiries: Susan Kruger. Tel. +27 (0) 12 809 9500 or email s.kruger@esteq.com Beckhoff Product Training 2019 TwinCAT 3 and TwinCAT 2 training courses, monthly, February-November 2019 Beckhoff Automation offers training for its system components such as TwinCAT 2, TwinCAT 3, IPCs, Embedded PCs, I/O and Motion products. The three-day training courses are run at Beckhoff Training Centres in Johannesburg, Cape Town, Port Elizabeth and Durban. Enquiries: Visit www.beckhoff.co.za or email training@beckhoff.co.za Engineering Community Conference ECC 2019, 12 June 2019

Collaboration is key to protecting critical infrastructure from cyber threats

C ritical infrastructure like national power grids are increasingly becoming a target of hackers and attacks. Several hacks reported around the globe in recent years have drawn attention to the vulnerability of national power supply systems and brought into question the safety of these and other infrastructural servic- es. “Cyber attacks, with widespread infrastruc- tural failures as their goal, have the potential to take down a country’s power grid. This has made cyber security a priority for global corpo- rates and often their first step to achieving this is by future-proofing their operations,” says Taru Madangombe, Schneider Electric Energy VP for Southern Africa. “In order to future-proof, utilities need to view cyber security as a pressing need rather than an afterthought.” He notes that hackers tend to focus on at- tacking critical infrastructure industrial process- es, rather than physical assets. Many plants are convinced that their net- works are isolated and consequently secure, but without ongoing audits and intrusion detec- tion that sense of security could be a delusion. “The growing demand for open informa- tion sharing between business and production networks increases the need to secure trans- actions and data. For power generating com- panies, where the consequences of an attack could have widespread impact, the need for cyber security is even more pressing,” says Madangombe. The open and interoperable nature of today’s industrial automation systems – many of which use the same computing and networking tech- nologies as general-purpose IT systems – re- quires engineers to pay close attention to net- work and cyber security issues. “It’s important to remember that threats can come from many sources, external or internal, ranging from terrorists to common criminals to environmental groups to disgruntled employ- ees. The technical knowledge, skills and tools required for penetrating IT and plant systems are becoming more widely available. As the incidence of threats increases, the level of so-

phistication necessary to implement an attack is decreasing, making it easier for intruders.” Power engineers play a critical role in hard- ening power operations against intruders, but collaboration and support of both corporate management and IT department are essential. A recent companywide vulnerability audit of a large U.S. utility revealed some areas of tech- nical vulnerability in the control system. How- ever, most of the findings had to do with organ- isational problems, such as lack of plant-wide awareness of cyber security issues in general, inconsistent administration of systems, lack of a cyber security incident response plan and poor physical access to some critical assets. “Corporate management first has to ac- knowledge the need for secure operations and because few companies have the resources to harden all processes against all possible threats, management should guide the devel- opment of a security policy that will set organ- isational security priorities and goals. In having all departments working together, project engi- neers need to understand the security risks and possible mitigation strategies, while IT, which brings much of the security expertise, must un- derstand the need for real time availability to keep units online,” says Madangombe. “Management also needs to recognise that investment in prevention will have a far greater payback than investment in detection and removal. Although investment in the latter areas may be necessary to ward off immedi- ate threats, focusing on activities that prevent attacks in the first place will reduce the need for future detection and removal expenditure.” Schneider Electric’s cyber security solutions protect the most critical of operations across diverse businesses and industry sectors. “We understand and apply cyber security solutions from the client’s operational perspective while integrating appropriate IT policies and require- ments. This allows clients to protect their busi- ness while embracing new technologies that enable these businesses to grow and deliver to their customers,” concludes Madangombe. Enquiries: Schneider Electric. Tel. +27 (0) 11 254 6400

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FEBRUARY 2019