The power grid is becoming increasingly complex due to the integration of municipal utilities, renewable energy resources, new substations and millions of smart grid edges like smart meters and EV-charging stations. The majority of this electric infrastructure is located far away from the central control room. Therefore, control is increasingly carried out digitally via remote access. To secure these peripheral systems, distribution and transmission system operators often rely exclusively on firewalls. These might reliably detect known malware. However, with several hundred of thousands of new malware variants each day, cybersecurity limited to identifying known signatures becomes highly unreliable.
Firewalls are blind to novel attack patterns, zero-day vulnerabilities and multi-stage cyberattacks using stolen credentials that often run for months or years. Geopolitically conflicting parties have already started to target critical infrastructure in long-running campaigns where adversaries try to preposition themselves for future impact using sophisticated techniques like Living-off-the-land (LOTL).
Consequently, though still challenging for many energy companies, the EU NIS2 directive and Cyber Resilience Act introduce a new framework that requires companies - and critical infrastructure in particular - to establish and operate bulletproof cybersecurity.
Security Made Simple Across the Entire Energy Distribution Space
Grid operators and solution providers need reliable end-to-end visibility of their operational technology to protect the grid. Moreover, they must verify to authorities that they comply with the growing number of cybersecurity and resilience requirements defined in standards and regulations.
Landis+Gyr’s security experts have developed security solutions that cover the entire grid in a multi-level approach, from central OT to substations, to head end systems and grid edge devices.
OT Security
Landis+Gyr’s OT Security solution is a powerful network-based intrusion detection system specifically designed for OT environments. The tried-and-tested OT monitoring with anomaly detection gives operators and security managers full OT visibility and real-time notifications, enabling them to quickly target and mitigate cyber attacks and avoid the disruption of industrial processes. Landis+Gyr can also help bridge any skills gap by operating the OT Security solution as a Managed Service.
Head End Security
Based on our experience protecting 300+ utilities with managing and securing their head end systems, Landis+Gyr’s Head End Security solution ensures your head end is operating safely and securely and is always available. The Head End Security solution provides continuous monitoring with advanced anomaly detection managed by Landis+Gyr’s security team, reducing the need for a specialized workforce and enabling rapid response to minimize impacts on smart meter management. 
Grid Edge Security
Smart meters, sensors, and distributed energy resources at the grid edge represent hundreds of millions of potential access points into local and national power grids. Landis+Gyr and its security arm, Rhebo, have developed an edge-based solution that provides security monitoring with anomaly detection and security automation directly on the edge device. The Grid Edge Security solution protects the network and central systems from grid edge attacks. The OS-agnostic solution can be easily integrated by vendors of grid edge devices due to its containerized deployment.
PKI as a Service
Landis+Gyr provides a comprehensive, cloud-based security offering that gives utilities a robust, scalable digital certificate management service. Secure digital certificates and keys verify the authenticity of entities involved in energy network communications and provide secure management for the exchange of information over the internet.
Navigate the legal landscape and find the right solutions
The legal and standard landscape for cybersecurity has become increasingly complex, too. Which new legislation affects your company? What are the pitfalls? Which standards are most important (and usable)?
Landis+Gyr offers multiple options for its customers to develop, enhance, and validate their cybersecurity strategy and ensure compliance for their electrical grid. Landis+Gyr is a trusted partner to assist your compliance and OT teams to understand and contextualize new security legislation and standard as well as to find the right technology to ensure both cybersecurity and compliance.
Visit us at Enlit Europe in Milan, Italy to find out how Landis+Gyr supports your critical infrastructure’s cybersecurity.
