Disaster Recovery and Risk

Asset Guardian ensures file security and data integrity

Process control software is a key component in the functional safety and operational integrity of any production plant. Ensuring the right person has access to the right information at the right time is critical to controlling the effective management and security of a company’s data and software.

With the increase in Cyberattacks targeted at process control software, preventing unauthorised access to software is becoming increasingly important. Research carried out showed that around 43% of security incidents were perpetrated by insiders. While unintentional breaches can occur, a user, employee or contractor can deliberately infiltrate and disrupt a system.

Asset Guardian limits unauthorised access to all data and software files by providing a secure central repository. Users of Asset Guardian have to log in to the system with a username and password.

The integrity of all files logged into Asset Guardian is protected by MD5 checksum verification. Despite advances in data connection and speed, there is still the possibility that data corruption can occur during transfer or storage.

Asset Guardian uses MD5 checksum verification to ensure that any file accessed from Asset Guardian is exactly the same as the file originally logged in.

Using storage media such as CDs, USBs and others, increases the risk of data corruption and provides an inefficient and ineffective method of version control management.

Asset Guardian securely protects companies software assets whilst simultaneously ensuring the right version of software can be accessed quickly to enable the plant to return safely to its pre-failure operational state.