I had the opportunity to attend Cisco Live 2018 in Orlando, FL. I was glad to have visited Orlando again after having lived there for 2 years. That part, perhaps, will be held for another entry.

Although Cisco Live is a great experience and provides a one-stop for all things networking, I find it particularly difficult to find something relevant or applicable to my industry. I work for a power company, providing solutions to support the power grid. The networks I help design and support provide connectivity for all of the Intelligent Electronic Devices (IED) which enable the power operators to have a real-time perspective; as well, to have control of the power grid. We are required to have nearly no down time; yet, support some of the most harsh conditions.

The other challenge I face is working to meld two worlds: Information Technology and Operational Technology. My experience has largely been in the IT world: network engineering, system administration, etc. Yet, I’ve come to learn and understand the complexities with the OT: protective relays, remote terminal units (RTU), etc. The two worlds, in my industry, are quickly merging. Where serial point-to-point circuits were abundant, my customers are now quickly adopting the use of Ethernet connected devices. Although the Ethernet connected devices do provide a greater amount of flexibility, they do provide an added complexity with security.

I attended a class called Industrial Security: IT vs OT Deployment Practices (BRKIOT-2115). I was hoping for a lot more – it was left at a very high-level review. Though, there is one idea which caught my attention: Security Group Tags (SGT). Conceptually, you can profile devices based on certain criteria and then apply a security policy to it. This allows you to apply network segmentation, even within the same layer-2 or layer-3 network. A similar approach is being taken with hospitals and their need to segment based on device type.

I hope to, in the near future, have another blog post where I can explain more on SGT and how it might be applied within the utility industry.

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