A new partnership for ICS Cybersecurity and security of Smart Cities

A new partnership for ICS Cybersecurity and security of Smart Cities

The IoT Security Institute (IoTSI) announced this week that it has established a collaborative partnership with MEASC and Quill Security Technology.

“This partnership acknowledges the increasing importance of a “time to act” approach to cybersecurity in smart cities and critical infrastructure design, operation and ongoing compliance services. Smart Cities are a must have in a smart digital age. They make economical and environmental sense. However, with regard to commercial and community safety and privacy expectations; how secure are they really? At present the Smart City express is more about selling the possibilities than the responsibilities. Very few are talking about the hard stuff. The safety and privacy challenges; those pesky trust models that make a smart city a commercial or societal success or failure “
states Alan Mihalic, President, IoT Security Institute.

“The goal of the partnership is to establish a comprehensive set of guidelines to help each of the supply chain participants specify, procure, install, integrate, operate and maintain IoT securely in smart cities and critical infrastructure. Cities are working spaces, information portals and community information exchanges that require appropriate security controls to meet their future potential. The group is looking to ensure that the recommendations produced are globally applicable and simple to adopt – fitting within existing processes wherever possible. To achieve this, the working group aims to open the channels of communication between building occupiers, facilities managers, engineers, designers and urban planners in relation to the cybersecurity challenges affecting building environments,” states Alan Mihalic

Mihalic adds “In a Smart Cities age, this includes maintaining data confidentiality, privacy and public safety levels that meet community and corporate expectations. This can only be achieved by establishing collaborative partnership with cyber and privacy industry leaders.”

ABOUT MEASC (Middle East and Africa Security Consortium)

“With our pioneering heritage and legacy, as Alacera International, in the development of the first US DHS endorsed Safe Smart Cities Reference Architecture and Technology overlay – Sentrix™; morphing into our current MEASC profile, of exclusively focusing on the delivery of – AI, Machine Learning, Blockchain based – safety and security solutions for Smart Cities, we are honored and privileged to establish this collaborative partnership with IoTSI, and MEASC eco-system partner Quill Security. We are excited and welcome IoTSI into our Safe Smart Cities Eco-System Partner network, and look forward to integrating their IoT Security Framework, and Best Practices with MEASC’s . We see the Middle East, especially the GCC region and Asia/ Asia-Pacific, as not only earliest adopters and deployments for Smart Cities, but more importantly, the most IoT enabled, and receptive to the next generation of Safe Smart Cities”; states – Abdel-Mohsen Al-Babtain, Chairman, MEASC SCC, and Vice-Chairman, MEASC Japan.
“Since the transition to reality of IoT, we have been searching for a globally motivated IoT Security Partner, that could integrate IoT Security into the latest iteration of our Sentrix™ Safe Smart Cities Reference Architecture – SentrixEC™(EC – “Enhanced Cognition”) We view MEASC as on the cusp of delivering “Fifth Industrial Revolution” safety and security best practices and solutions to Smart Cities; and with the IoTSI and Quill Security collaboration, we are confident of both achieving this goal, and accelerating its timeline”; states – M.O. “Mo” Bakheit, Managing Partner, and Co-Founder, MEASC SCC.

ABOUT QUILL

Quill Security Technology has established a collaborative partnership with MEASC and IoTSI to build a Center of Excellence in the Smart City Risk Assessment space. Together this partnership will adapt Quill’s physical security Risk Mapping technology to support multi-domain security operations for IoT-enabled Smart Cities.
IoT security technology adds a particularly high level of complexity to threat assessments and security posture planning because they are inherently multi-domain devices, subject to, and protecting against threats in the cyber- and physical-world. This makes Quill the ideal partner to bring real-time, cross-domain risk assessment to Smart Cities globally. “Quill Security Technology has broken new ground in continuously assessing physical security risk. Now, in partnership with MEASC and IoTSI, we look forward to bringing that same level of innovation and applicability to IoT enabled security programs and Smart Cities”. – Lewis Werner, CEO and Founder of Quill Security Technology.