According to the latest report by Kaspersky on the IoTthe smart cities are the most common area of use of this technologyso much so that the 62% of organizations that use IoT applications globally use them in projects of this type. Following recent announcements on the development of Neoman ambitious and futuristic one smart city in a desertKaspersky focuses on the role of cybersecurity in this type of city.
The futuristic Smart City in Saudi Arabia
Saudi Arabia has plans to build one futuristic and sustainable smart city in the Tabuk desert. The city will be 170 km long and will include smart cities, a porta airportbeyond business and entertainment environments. The project expects Neom to use the 100% renewable energy and produce zero emissionsis fully digitized and uses advanced technologies and production processes.
Neom it is still in the planning phase but 62% of companies around the world use the IoT in the smart city field. This figure increases, reaching 74% in the Asia Pacific region (APAC), 71% in the META region, which includes the Arab States of the Persian Gulf, Africa and the Eastern Mediterranean countries, and 67% in North America. , which represent the top three regions of IoT use in this area.
A smart city is a cyber-physical systemwhere physical and digital security are essential for the proper functioning of city services, especially with regard to highly digitized projects such as Neom.
The same threats faced by the IoT and traditional IT systems can also pose a danger to smart cities. Currently, one of the most widespread risks is the ransomware capable of attacking various public utilities. Furthermore, smart cities are prone to attacks on connected devices and objects, such as CCTV cameras, which attackers can access. Equally at risk of exposure are websites and applications connected to the IoT. Targeted attacks on infrastructure are serious incidents, as they can not only cause commercial losses, but can also directly affect citizens. For example, in 2019, a targeted ransomware attack that hit Baltimore knocked out a number of the city’s utilities.
Cybersecurity policies for smart cities should include basic measures, such as strict encryption and password policiesvulnerability management, network segmentation and a Zero Trust model, as well as firewalls and dedicated protection for any cloud infrastructure to which smart city systems and applications are connected. In addition, dedicated IoT security solutions, such as security gateways, are required to connect IoT devices to corporate applications and ensure the security of communications and data passing through them. In organizations where IT infrastructure is connected to smart city objects and systems, endpoint and network protection must be used that can detect and respond to various threats.
“A smart city implies a set of vertical elements and subsystems that must work together to offer services to residents and allow public organizations to manage digital systems. The huge amount of data generated can lead to financial and social benefits. This transformation requires the implementation of natively secure components that can anticipate threats. We design and develop these components, including IoT gateways and smart controllers, based on the principles of Cyber Immunity. For example, in modern smart cities, systems for buildings and public services allow public administration managers to control the consumption of water and heat. During one of Kaspersky’s pilot projects, a hospital was connected to a smart city system so that a utility could securely receive and analyze reliable data. Thanks to this project, the hospital was able to detect abuse: a neighborhood organization illegally connected to the pipeline and used the water for its own needs, while the hospital paid the bills “, commented Andrey Suvorov, Head of KasperskyOS Business Unit at Kaspersky.
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