Abstract
The awareness of Operational Technology (OT) cybersecurity has increasingly come into focus with the recent OT Master Plan launched by CSA during OTCEP event in August 2024. This presentation will touch on the need to balance risk and reward while facing the challenges when ensuring compliance while achieving effective outcomes. The questions is who is to decide on how much of rules-based and risk-based approaches. Critical to OT environments are safety and availability in the face of failure probabilities and vulnerability assessment. This lends itself to challenge the widely accepted CIA triad (confidentiality, integrity, available). A proactive, risk-based strategy helps prioritize security in systems with long life cycles, while addressing ever evolving cyber threats with a calibrated and educated approach. The life cycle cost of assets, including maintenance and software updates or fixes, is also key in maintaining the security posture while supporting safe and continuous operations in critical infrastructure like energy, manufacturing, and utilities.
Speaker’s Profile
David Ong
CEO
Attila Cybertech
David Ong, the founder of Excel Marco in 2000, an Automation Systems Integrator, has over 30 years of experience in process automation safety, specializing in functional safety and cybersecurity. He holds an MBA and is also an Alumni in Harvard Business School for post-graduate education. Serving in ASMI Council, he also chairs the Enterprise Committee previously and now the Digitalization Committee. Throughout his career, David has always been passionate about Process Automation Control & Safety. More recently, also extending his interest into IOT and Cybersecurity.
