Sunday, October 12, 2014

Case for Mobile Devices in Automation



One of the fastest growing and most prevalent trends in HMI and SCADA software realms is mobility. That's how we can - and must - make use of mobile devices in automated work environments?

There are those who have concerns about safety. Is a mobile device secure enough for them to access data on sensitive processes? And if so, how much access should be? Read / write? Read only? Should be restricted to a subset of data? And if so, how can our user access control to ensure that users have access only what they are allowed to see? Have these devices open holes in the network, giving access to malicious programs sensitive controls?

While some of the security issues are certainly valid, it is impossible to overlook the benefits of mobile devices, and the truth is that many of the security problems are not inherent in the devices themselves, but in how the HMI / SCADA system and configure network infrastructure.

Consider some of the pain that mobile devices can help eliminates:

        A field operator to call the control room to ask to read some piece of equipment (valves, switches etc.) he / she is looking at or handling.
        A field operator to call the control room to confirm whether a particular piece of real substance has been closed for maintenance since it sounds like it is still running. Read More

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