Sumo Logic and NIST team up to secure energy sector IoT

The energy industry used to operate on a simple hub-and-spoke model, in which large power plants would produce energy in a centralized location and distribute it out to consumers. Yet as solar, wind, and other small-scale renewable energy sources take hold in the market, that hub-and-spoke model is being replaced by a complex grid of interconnected devices.

In this decentralized model, securing millions of solar panels, wind turbines, and power grid management devices is proving to be a significant challenge. In the absence of a common framework for industrial IoT security, power grids remain as vulnerable as the weakest link in the chain. Most energy companies are not equipped to monitor the rapidly growing amount of data coming from a multi-source grid of devices and systems.

That’s why Sumo Logic, the leader in continuous intelligence, was chosen through a competitive process by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) to raise the standard of cybersecurity for industrial IoT systems. The partnership, led by the National Cybersecurity Center of Excellence (NCCoE), is part of the Securing the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT): Cybersecurity for Distributed Energy Resources Project.

As a participant in the project, Sumo Logic will provide energy companies with best practices that include leveraging continuous intelligence as part of a standards-based reference design to improve the overall security of industrial IoT in commercial and utility-scale distributed energy resource environments.

To support the NCCoE project’s mission, Sumo Logic will show energy companies how to leverage a continuous intelligence platform to get the insights they need to prevent, detect and mitigate malware within increasing complex and distributed network environments. This will help to ensure data integrity for distributed devices and improve system performance and resilience.

“As more industrial power grids shift to a distributed network based on interconnected sensors, it is imperative that energy companies employ a continuous intelligence approach to help them handle the tsunami of data coming from these devices,” said Doug Natal, General Manager, US Public Sector, Sumo Logic. “Working with the NCCoE gives us a great opportunity to help the energy sector future proof their technology and keep up with the country’s rapidly transforming power grid.”

The best practices contributed by Sumo Logic will be included in the NCCoE cybersecurity practice guide expected to be released later this year. The NCCoE, a part of the National Institute of Standards and Technology, is a public-private partnership that brings together industry organizations, government agencies and academic institutions under cooperative research and development agreements to collaborate in the creation of practical cybersecurity solutions that address the needs of specific industries as well as broad, cross-sector technology challenges.