There have been hundreds of cyberattacks against manufacturing companies in recent years, including high-profile breaches at JBS Foods and Colonial Pipeline. With these in mind, let’s examine what makes attacks on manufacturing companies particularly unique.
In most industries, a cyberattack results in financial damages and back-end closures in certain functional areas (e.g., finance, accounting, e-mail). Those are concerns for manufacturers, as well.
However, there is an extra layer of complication for manufacturing organizations, as they often cannot keep operations going following a cyberattack. When a manufacturer is breached, it typically takes down the entire organization – the production line, the facilities, the distribution, everything. So, in many ways, a cyberattack is a “perfect storm,” often more devastating to a manufacturing organization than it is to companies in other industries.
As a result, cybersecurity needs to be an extremely high priority for manufacturing organizations. If for no other reason than because hackers know manufacturers have a lot to lose in a cyberattack, making them more willing (in many cases) to pay hefty…
