Social infrastructure systems provide 24-hour/365-day support for both business and daily life. However, along with efficiency improvements such as the application of IoT technology and operation over a wide area, and coordination between operators, security threats continue to rise year by year, including a growing diversity of cyber-attacks. In response, Hitachi is working to achieve a safe and secure society by engaging in collaborative creation with numerous organizations based on the concept of protection at the system, organization, and operational levels. This issue of Hitachi Review describes the associated technologies, products, and solutions, including specific examples of how they are deployed.
Threats to the security of social infrastructure systems are on the rise against a background of increasingly sophisticated cyber-attacks and a changing security environment inside and outside of Japan.
Social infrastructure systems provide uninterrupted 24-hour/365-day services such as the electric power, gas, and water that underpin daily life and business activity. The social infrastructure systems that deliver these services are steadily advancing and seeking to improve efficiency, increasingly operating over wide areas, with interoperation between different providers and use of systems based on the Internet of Things (IoT).
Not a day goes by without news of a security incident, whether it be an information leak, unauthorized access, or malware. Recent cases have also emerged of ransomware, which holds information for ransom and demands money. In February of this year, the operations of a Los Angeles hospital were disrupted by ransomware that infected its PCs.
THE social infrastructure that underpins daily life and business is required to ensure service continuity even during times of difficulty. Many different types of services, including government, finance, and healthcare as well as electric power, gas, water, and railways, are expected to provide 24-hour/365-day uninterrupted operation, or at least to maintain a bare minimum of essential services at all times.