More than two-thirds (68%) of surveyed critical infrastructure organizations lack complete, real-time visibility into the assets connected to their operational technology (OT) networks, complicating protection against cyberattacks, according to a new report commissioned by Palo Alto Networks and conducted by Sapio Research.
The report, based on a survey of more than 1,600 leaders across 11 countries, found that 60% of organizations experienced a security incident affecting operations in the past year. Respondents represented manufacturing, healthcare and life sciences, energy and utilities, transportation, and government and public-sector organizations. OT includes systems that monitor or control physical equipment and processes.
"Visibility matters because it supports decisions about protecting the operation," explained Harry Thomas, CTO and co-founder of Frenos , an OT security testing firm in Fulton, Md.
"Knowing a device exists is a starting point," he told TechNewsWorld. "Teams also need to understand what it controls, what depends on it, who can access it, and what would happen if it became unavailable or its settings changed."
"That context helps defenders prioritize risks and determine how to respond without creating a larger operational problem," he added.
Anup Kumar, CEO of Optiv Consulting , a cybersecurity advisory firm in Ashburn, Va., explained that OT visibility is challenging because environments often combine legacy equipment, proprietary protocols, and systems designed for reliability, not routine scanning.
"What works in IT can create risk in OT," he told TechNewsWorld. "Without visibility, organizations cannot identify exposed assets, detect abnormal activity, or respond quickly to threats. Safe, continuous visibility is the foundation of operational resilience."
One of the challenges to protecting critical infrastructure is that it's constrained by assets that cannot be taken offline long enough to patch, while geopolitical tensions and expanding connectivity increase pressure on providers already working with limited resources, noted Jacob Krell, senior director for secure AI solutions and cybersecurity at Suzu Labs , a provider of AI-powered cybersecurity services in Las Vegas.
"Palo Alto's report connects that pressure to real operational consequences, including safety concerns, unplanned downtime, production disruption and financial losses," he told TechNewsWorld.
"The common thread is incomplete visibility across legacy systems, unmanaged devices, private 5G networks and other connected assets," he said. "Separate IT and OT security teams, along with multiple disconnected tools, make the response slower and harder to coordinate."
"The burden is heavier for utilities, hospitals, manufacturers, transport operators and government agencies because they cannot treat cybersecurity as a normal software-maintenance exercise," he added. "A security team may know that a programmable logic controller is vulnerable, but still lack a reliable answer to the question that matters operationally: which pump, production step or safety process does it control?"
Surveyed organizations use an average of seven separate security systems and tools. Fifty-nine percent said multiple systems create operational complexity, 56% reported higher operating costs, and 41% cited delayed incident response.
The report found that 51% of organizations still rely on vulnerability severity scores or manual alert review for prioritization.…