Centralised security services protect plant data

Rockwell Automation has introduced centralised security services for all Rockwell Software and third party products, allowing IT engineers to administer security from a single workstation

Plant data security is an increasing concern among production managers and controls engineers and, in response, Rockwell Automation has introduced centralised security services for all Rockwell Software and third party products.

The Rockwell Software Maintenance Automation Control Centre (RSMACC) promotes best practice by replacing security functions in individual applications with a centralised system, allowing engineers to administer security from a single workstation.

This avoids the need to make changes locally at each production line or piece of machinery, saving time and ensuring security settings are consistent throughout the plant.

More manufacturers are seeing the benefits of opening up their industrial networks to their IT systems and, via the Internet or company intranets, making them available to users anywhere in the world.

While this approach brings undoubted business benefits, it leaves vital plant control systems increasingly vulnerable to malicious or accidental tampering.

There are three key elements to administering security effectively: resources, such as PLCs, workstations or software applications; users; and actions.

Administrators limit the actions that any user can perform using a particular resource.

RSMACC embodies one of the key principles of plant floor security - setting limits on who can do what from where.

For example, a human resources manager should never be able to change a PLC programme, but nor should engineers be allowed to make such changes to parts of the plant for which they are not responsible.

Equally, technicians' access should be limited to match their skills and levels of responsibility.

RSMACC lets administrators set up groups of users, resources and actions.

For example, some electricians may be allowed to update programmes on certain PLCs using particular workstations.

Using RSMACC presents no extra hurdles for users, who simply log on to their workstations as usual.

RSMACC runs as a Windows service and uses Windows' own domain security to validate users.

RSMACC has in-built event logging which allows administrators to track users who perform any tasks, including protected actions, or change the security configuration.

These events - including date and time, the user and workstation, and the resource affected by the event - are logged in a Windows application log or to an ASCII text file for easy viewing and reporting.

RSMACC also provides a central repository and audit trail for plant-wide maintenance information, and offers a complete plant data security and change management solution to today's open industrial networks.

Back to top