CyberX Launches Breach & Attack Vector Prediction for Industrial Networks — First Solution to Predict Most Likely Paths of Targeted ICS Attacks

CyberX, provider of the most widely-deployed industrial cybersecurity platform for continuously reducing ICS risk, today announced new breach and attack vector simulation technology that incorporates proprietary analytics to predict and help prevent targeted attacks on critical Operational Technology (OT) assets.

An industry first, CyberX’s new ICS Attack Vector Prediction technology generates a visual representation of all possible attack chains — ranked by risk — that can compromise critical OT assets, such as robotics machinery in manufacturing plants and circuit breakers in electrical substations.  This innovative approach immediately highlights the most important security gaps, enabling OT security teams to proactively mitigate risk and prioritize mitigation activities based on the most likely attack scenarios — enabling more effective use of limited skilled resources and narrow maintenance windows.

Security teams can quickly simulate what-if mitigation actions, such as “If I isolate or patch this insecure device, does it eliminate the risk to my most critical assets?” In addition, visualization of potential breach paths (see screen shot) helps business management and OT stakeholders more easily understand the business impact of top risks to their most valuable assets.

“Targeted attacks and malware pose real and demonstrable risks to critical infrastructure and industrial organizations,” said Nir Giller, CTO/CISO and co-founder of CyberX. “But as we’ve seen from recent attacks, it’s not always practical to patch or upgrade older ICS/SCADA systems and devices.  CyberX’s new ICS Attack Vector Prediction technology helps security teams dramatically increase OT resilience by validating precisely which mitigations — such as network zoning or stronger authentication — can effectively eliminate the attack vectors with the highest risk of compromising critical assets.”

Proprietary Analytics Enable Attack Vector Simulation Without Impacting OT Infrastructures

CyberX’s attack vector simulation is based on its detailed analysis of all network and endpoint vulnerabilities identified by CyberX’s agentless asset discovery and vulnerability assessment technology.  Unlike active vulnerability scanning approaches developed for IT rather than OT environments, the CyberX platform combines a deep understanding of industrial protocols and industrial devices with non-invasive network traffic analysis (NTA), in order to comprehensively identify OT vulnerabilities without impacting OT networks or causing downtime of operational assets.

CyberX was the first industrial cybersecurity company to enrich its platform for continuous monitoring and ICS behavioral analytics with ICS vulnerability assessments, and the first to establish an in-house ICS threat intelligence research team.  Composed of world-class cyber experts with nation-state experience defending critical infrastructures, CyberX’s R&D team developed its Attack Vector Prediction technology using their deep expertise about industrial networks and real-world attacker tactics.

According to Gartner, “Security and risk management leaders often focus on point solutions for prevention, with the unattainable objective of blocking 100% of threats.  New services aim to change this dynamic by continuously assessing and managing security procedures, infrastructure, vulnerabilities and techniques.  Breach and attack simulation technologies can help leaders prepare for strikes against critical assets.”[i]

In a related release, CyberX today announced that, with the delivery of this new attack prediction technology, CyberX is now the only industrial cybersecurity provider addressing all four requirements of Gartner’s Adaptive Security Model, including Prediction, Prevention, Detection, and Response.

CyberX will be demonstrating its new Attack Vector Prediction technology at Black Hat 2017 in Las Vegas, July 26-27 (booth #58 in the Innovation City).

 About CyberX (Twitter: @CyberX_Labs)

CyberX provides the most widely-deployed cybersecurity platform for continuously reducing risk to critical industrial infrastructures. Deployed in the world’s largest environments and backed by military-grade cyber experts, the CyberX platform uniquely combines continuous ICS threat monitoring with proprietary M2M behavioral analytics and ICS-specific threat intelligence to identify advanced cyberattacks in real-time.

By monitoring ICS/SCADA/OT networks for targeted attacks, ransomware and industrial malware, the CyberX platform enables organizations to prevent costly production outages, catastrophic safety failures, and theft of corporate IP.

CyberX has gained considerable industry recognition including being named a “Cool Vendor” by Gartner and one of the “10 Coolest IoT Start-Ups” by CRN. The company is also the only industrial cybersecurity vendor selected for the SINET16 Innovator Award sponsored by the US DHS and DoD, and the only ICS security vendor recognized by the International Society of Automation (ISA).

An active member of the Industrial Internet Consortium (IIC) and the ICS-ISAC, CyberX’s groundbreaking ICS threat intelligence research was recently featured in the popular McGraw-Hill book series, “ICS Hacking Exposed.” For more information visit CyberX-Labs.com.

[i] Gartner “Cool Vendors in Monitoring and Management of Threats to Applications and Data, 201, 8 June 2017