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Industrial cybersecurity delivers ROI

Kaspersky Industrial CyberSecurity (KICS) – a dedicated solution for operation technology (OT) and industrial control systems (ICS) protection – has saved one company $2.2 million, according to a Total Economic Impact (TEI) study, commissioned by Kaspersky Lab and delivered by Forrester Consulting as of April 2019.

KICS for Nodes is specifically designed to address threats at operator level in ICS environments, ensuring a customer avoids the costs associated with system downtime, OS upgrades and the use of legacy endpoint antivirus solutions. With the overall solution costing $470 950, the customer achieved benefits resulting in a 368% return on investment (ROI) after three years.

The level of threats facing industrial companies was maintained: in 2018, malicious activity was detected and prevented on almost half of all ICS computers (47%). If an incident does strike, companies may suffer downtime, disruption to production lines and products or even risk the safety of their employees. As such, OT and ICS infrastructure requires a special approach to cybersecurity. It is crucial to implement a dedicated OT/ICS security solution: traditional IT protection for endpoints does not work effectively on OT networks and may not be compatible with specific scada software, controllers and IoT devices widely used in production.

In addition to providing high level protection from cyber threats, a dedicated solution is more cost-effective. Designed to meet the characteristics of industrial computers and networks, it doesn’t inhibit the operation of industrial equipment or lead to downtime as a result of malware. The Forrester study, The Total Economic Impact Of Kaspersky Industrial CyberSecurity revealed that the company assessed – which deployed KICS for Nodes after using traditional endpoint AV on industrial endpoints – avoided costs associated with downtime of $1.7 million. This accounted for 77% of all the benefits achieved from the KICS for Nodes deployment.

The study also found that the company was able to save a significant sum of money on product upgrades. Using traditional antivirus solutions required upgrading the OS on the industrial equipment to newer versions compatible with the traditional AV. Getting rid of these upgrades through using KICS for Nodes allowed the company to save $461 495 (with the update of one endpoint costing $600 per year). Ending the renewal of its traditional antivirus solution also saved the company an additional $50 000.

According to the Forrester study: “Interviewees cited the confidence in the security of the infrastructure that KICS delivers. [Interviewees] know that with this specialised software, their industrial systems are better protected, and the information security team is reducing the overall risk of security breaches for the organisation.”

“There is a common belief that cybersecurity is a black hole that demands money but never brings any return. The study by a leading global research and advisory firm revealed that in reality, cybersecurity can be an investment with solid benefits, both in terms of efficiency and finances. The use of a dedicated ICS security solution instead of a traditional corporate one ensures full and up-to-date protection for both new and legacy systems, using a single management console. This will allow companies to save good money and reallocate it to more high priority tasks – just as we saw in this example,” says Georgy Shebuldaev, head of Kaspersky Industrial Cybersecurity Business Development.

Kaspersky Industrial CyberSecurity is a dedicated portfolio of technologies and services designed to protect operational technology layers and elements of industrial enterprises. More information about the solution is available on the Kaspersky Industrial CyberSecurity web site. https://ics.kaspersky.com/

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