Worker safety, product quality, and equipment obsolescence are ongoing challenges. At the same time, security threats can disrupt control systems, create new safety risks, and put your intellectual property in jeopardy.
Incorporate industrial risk management into your connected enterprise strategy to help you address these challenges to protect both your assets and your company brand.
Industrial risk management should be directed at the areas where incidents such as worker injuries, data breaches, and product recalls originate. In many cases, that is your industrial automation infrastructure.
The four key areas that your risk management efforts should address include:
Industrial security risks threaten more than intellectual property loss, disrupted operations, and compromised product quality. They also can endanger human and environmental safety. Compromised safety systems can expose individual workers and entire facilities to safety risks. In addition, tampered or disrupted systems can threaten the food, medication, water, and energy supplies that populations depend on.
When you integrate safety and security in a connected enterprise and follow key steps, you can assess, manage, and mitigate the safety implications of security risks.
New regulations aim to strengthen supply chains and improve product traceability. These regulations create new requirements for food, pharmaceutical, metals, and other manufacturers to implement serialization or traceability solutions.
A holistic serialization system can help you meet these requirements and create seamless data sharing across the supply chain and traceability down to the saleable unit level. A serialization or track-and-trace system also offers additional business benefits in a connected enterprise. Reverse logistics, for example, can help you conduct more efficient product recalls and provide valuable data for improved forecasting.
Worried about cyber security in a connected enterprise? If so, consider that many organizations already have legacy technologies in place that deliver data to unprotected automation systems. As the number of connected devices grows, so do the entry points for hackers. The Connected Enterprise presents an opportunity to manage these risks and enhance security.
Smarter technologies in a connected enterprise can also help manage safety. Self-aware equipment can monitor its own performance and alert personnel before safety issues arise. Mobile terminals can help keep workers at a safe distance from equipment. Embedded intelligence can help protect product integrity and consumer safety.
