IN DEMAND
è How does cybersecurity harmonize with classic è Does that also apply to Phoenix Contact?
industry and conventional IT? Of course. If we, with our importance on the market, are NOT
Quite well, actually. We are the experts for our specialized attacked by certain states from Southeast Asia for the purpose
field. This is generally appreciated in IT. of industrial espionage, then we would have done something
The situation is often quite different in production. Usually wrong. We also constantly educate ourselves in daily defen-
there’s no one in charge of security. When a machine is set sive combat, so we’re training for ourselves as well as for our
up, nobody thinks about how it will be cleanly integrated customers.
into the network. The last thing they’re going to moan about
is why the controller isn’t connected. There’s still a lot of
phoenixcontact.de/services
“pulling strings” to be done.
But in financial controlling, we are usually looked at as
just a cost factor. That’s not half bad. You can do without.
We often suffer very large damages, but these are quite
rare. Therefore, everyone believes that it won’t affect their
company.
è In which fields is Phoenix Contact active when it
comes to cybersecurity?
We are active both in our own company and with customers.
This helps in both directions, because it also increases our
understanding of consulting in the production areas. And
our new certifications show that we can competently map
and offer all processes, including stocktaking, installation,
commissioning, and training. This is TÜV-tested, quite
literally.
We have just completed and successfully passed a very
complex, multi-stage certification process with TÜV Süd.
This shows how seriously we really take this.
è In your opinion, what does the future hold for
companies when it comes to security?
In principle, it can be assumed that the massively growing
threat will put management under pressure. In the supply
chain, customers are putting more pressure on since security
is increasingly becoming an issue in supplier evaluation.
Legislatively, new rules are also inevitable.
è Openness and privacy – isn’t the network protection
industry itself becoming too invested in exaggerating
privacy when it comes to cyber attacks?
It’s a question of culture. It is true that an exchange about
threats and attacks that have occurred is important for
everyone. Companies that aren’t listed on the stock exchange
already communicate quite openly here. Concealment is
downright harmful.
“Being attacked doesn’t
mean you’ve done a
bad job. Not fending
them off means you’ve
done a bad job.”
Dr. Lutz Jänicke
But if, for example, a DAX company reports a successful
attack, then share values will also fall. But even here, the way
of thinking about it is slowly changing. Everyone is being
attacked. It isn’t a sign of weakness. Only those who do not
act are acting negligently. And those claiming they haven’t
been attacked probably just didn’t notice the attack.
The Phoenix Contact innovation magazine
UPDATE 4/20
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