OT/ICS systems and networks administration

Energy efficiency alternatives are nowadays on everyone’s lips given the energy crisis that is plaguing the vast majority of European regions. In Spain, the energetic companies are following alternatives based on the use of different technologies to solve problems as complex as such as the management of surplus energy in some infrastructures. One of the alternatives that seems to have greater depth within the sector is the use of Virtual Power Plant (VPP). This new concept of energy management makes it possible to interweave different energy sources into a single flow of electricity demand, managed through a global solution that is usually deployed in the cloud due to the amount of data that has to be processed. The management system proposed by Virtual Power Plant is simple: Take advantage of surplus energy from microgrids to balance supplies to infrastructures that need this energy. With this gesture, large distributors can take advantage of up to almost 100% of the power within all infrastructures, such as electric vehicle chargers, solar farms, wind turbine farms, etc.

Knowing the resources available when performing tasks of hardening a system, will allow us to optimize the time necessary to obtain a safer system. In addition, we have the possibility of using tools capable of auditing the system that identifies those configurations that are considered safe and which ones we could implement.

The proliferation of cybersecurity incidents in industrial environments has given rise to a huge concern in the various existing sectors. Some of them, such us the energy sector, are choosing the path taking in the banking sector with the TIBER-EU framework. In addition, many governments are allocating large sums of money to their government agencies to develop strategic plans in which that exercises are included

The programming of PLCs is a fundamental part of the initial phases when building and designing industrial plants. About that environment, the company will base all its operations in that environment making the configuration of these controllers a critical element. When it comes to programming these devices there are a series of steps and best practices that take advantage of the native functionalities available and that involve little or no need to resort to a PLC programmer, protecting the device in a simple way with minimum spend on resource.