Security: Yokogawa partners to add industrial firewall

Tofino security appliances accepted after rigorous testing

By Control Engineering Staff May 8, 2008

Yokogawa Electric Corp. has chosen the Tofino Industrial Security Solution as its first industrial firewall, giving Yokogawa’s Centum CS 3000 production control system and Stardom network-based control system customers access to new security technology that is smart enough to create its own firewall rules based on observation of traffic patterns. The company also released an enhanced version of its Stardom network-based control system.

Jointly developed and marketed by MTL Instruments (part of Cooper Crouse-Hinds) and Byres Security Inc ., the Tofino Industrial Security Solution is designed for industrial control operations in critical industries such as oil and gas, manufacturing, utilities, and power generation. Tofinos are small, industrially-hardened security appliances deployed throughout a refinery or industrial plant and centrally managed for a coordinated security approach.

Each appliance is placed in front of one or more mission-critical control devices, such as the Stardom industrial controller or sub-system interfaces of a Centum CS 3000 which run the open industrial protocols, and then tuned to meet the security requirements of those systems. According to Yokogawa, the approval of Tofino will give Yokogawa’s SCADA and process control equipment customers the ability to deploy “defense-in-depth security” in industrial systems.

As Yokogawa’s “Security Standard of System Product” guidelines note: “Threats of the security are under daily evolution. What is more, the threats of the security happen not only in the external networks like business networks, but also on process control network, which is an internal network. We have to get armed with the defense-in-depth strategy… [meaning] the protection measures composed of more than one security control to protect the property. By the use of this kind of multilayer measure, another layer will protect the property even if one layer is destroyed, so the property is protected more firmly.”

Approval came after months of extensive testing and analysis. “The Yokogawa testing process is extremely rigorous,” said Scott Howard, Byres Security development manager. “I was very impressed with the competence and level of focus displayed by the Yokogawa team — nothing went unnoticed or untested.”

Eric Byres, CTO of Byres Security, added, “If companies want to meet the new ANSI/ISA-99 security standards, it is critical they divide up their plant operations into security zones and then protect each zone in the most appropriate manner. It is no longer good security practice or cost effective just to lump everything together behind one big firewall and pray that you are secure.”

Howard said the Tofino Industrial Security Solution is “designed by control engineers for control engineers, so that they can focus on keeping a system reliable, yet secure, meeting or exceeding the available standards and regulations.” PT Lim, Yokogawa global account manager for MTL Instruments, said, "Companies looking to achieve professional levels of cyber security and operational excellence for their industrial control networks will find the Tofino Industrial Security Solution a valuable asset, and a sensible investment for an uncertain future.”

New controllers announced
Tofinos work with the latest version of Stardom controls, which include network templates that improve the reusability of applications, and support for the American Gas Association’s AGA3, AGA7, and AGA8 standards (used in North America, South America, and Asia). The latter ensures correct flow measurement as gas is transported between drilling companies and distribution companies. A new data-logging function allows FCN/FCJ autonomous controllers to store control and field-instrument data for access via the Web.

The next generation of Yokogawa’s Centum distributed control system (DCS) is scheduled for release in June. Sidney Hill, Jr., executive editor of Manufacturing Business Technology (a Control Engineering sister publication) says the operator console—or human-machine interface (HMI)—is the most visible change. The interface on Centum VP is much more graphic-oriented, making heavy use of colors and animation, but it also gives operators access to information they could not get before, such as Rockwell Automation Allen-Bradley PLCs or historical databases.

For more on the Tofino security appliance, see Peter Welander’s article .

–edited by Renee Robbins , senior editor, Control Engineering Daily News Desk