Manufacturing industry most exposed to cyber threats, Deloitte says

Security researchers have regularly expressed concern across industries that manufacturers are particularly vulnerable to cyber threats, and now a study finally backs them up.

After interviewing 35 manufacturing executives and analyzing 225 survey responses from industry executives, Deloitte discovered that the manufacturing industry is the most open to attacks and could lose millions of dollars in revenue, not to mention damage to brand reputation.

The shortage of skilled cybersecurity professionals is a common challenge for some 50 percent of executives, who feel this turns their organizations into easy targets.

Another problem, faced by almost 48 percent of organizations, is the lack of proper funding for security strategies and technologies to prevent cyberattacks, while 36 percent feel their IP networks are most at risk because they don”t have the proper means to protect them.

“Industrial control systems (ICS) are critical to manufacturing activities,” the report found, yet “just 50 percent of companies segment or isolate ICS networks from their standard networks.”

As widely agreed by others in the industry, employees are the weakest link in organizations because they most often fall victim to phishing schemes, through which hackers gain full network access. Employees are a preferred target among hackers due to a lack of training in how to maintain safe behavior online.

Following this research, executives strive to find a suitable strategy to properly manage infrastructures, anticipate incidents and mitigate threats in accordance with existing regulations. Each organization has different demands and emergencies to attend to, but overall they experience similar scenarios.