"Stronger Cybersecurity for Factories of the Future"

Ohio State's Center for Design and Manufacturing Excellence (CDME) gives a peek into the future of manufacturing, with students working on various projects on any given day. Inside the facility, where robotic arms are connected to a row of computers, Vimal Samuel Buck, senior researcher and director of cybersecurity at CDME, and his team are focused on protection against hackers. According to Buck, the factories of the future are all interconnected and connected to the Internet. This advanced technology provides numerous benefits, but it also exposes factories to an increased risk of cyber intrusion. As automation becomes more critical in manufacturing, the possibility of something going wrong increases. If it does, workers must know whether the problem is normal and can be easily fixed, or if the cause is more sinister. Buck and a group of researchers, undergraduates, and graduate students in CDME's Artificially Intelligent Manufacturing Systems (AIMS) lab are developing methods to predict the trustworthiness of robotic equipment and detect abnormal behavior. The AIMS team is approaching this problem in an interdisciplinary and multifaceted manner. Cameras and sensors are used to monitor the equipment, and the code that runs the automated systems is examined for indications of a problem. They are also leveraging Ohio State's extensive research capabilities, bringing in Machine Learning (ML) and integrated systems experts from the Department of Integrated Systems Engineering, and utilizing the university's penetration testing team to look for cyber vulnerabilities. This article continues to discuss the CDME's work to improve the cybersecurity of factories. 

OSU reports "Stronger Cybersecurity for Factories of the Future"