Day: June 15, 2022

93% of OT Organizations Experienced an Intrusion in Past 12 Months, and 78% Experienced More than Three

SUNNYVALE, Calif., June 15, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) —

John Maddison, EVP of Products and CMO at Fortinet
“This year’s global State of OT and Cybersecurity Report demonstrates that while OT security has the attention of organizational leaders, critical security gaps remain. PLCs designed without security, continued intrusions, a lack of centralized visibility across OT activities, and growing connectivity to OT are some of the critical challenges these organizations need to address. Security converged into the OT networking infrastructure, including switches and access points and firewalls, is essential to segment the environment. This combined with a platform that spans OT, converged OT/IT and IT provides end-to-end visibility and control.”

News Summary
Fortinet® (NASDAQ: FTNT), a global leader in broad, integrated, and automated cybersecurity solutions, today released its global 2022 State of Operational Technology and Cybersecurity Report. While industrial control environments continue to be a target for cyber criminals – with 93% of Operational Technology (OT) organizations experiencing an intrusion in the past 12 months – the report uncovered widespread gaps in industrial security and indicated opportunities for improvements. Key findings of the report include:

• OT activities lack centralized visibility, increasing security risks. The Fortinet report found that only 13% of respondents have achieved centralized visibility of all OT activities. Additionally, only 52% of organizations are able to track all OT activities from the security operations center (SOC). At the same time, 97% of global organizations consider OT a moderate or significant factor in their overall security risk. The report findings indicate that the lack of centralized visibility contributes to organizations’ OT security risks and weakened security posture.
• OT security intrusions significantly impact organizations’ productivity and their bottom line. The Fortinet report found that 93% of OT organizations experienced at least one intrusion in the past 12 months and 78% had more than three intrusions. As a result of these intrusions, nearly 50% of organizations suffered an operation outage that affected productivity with 90% of intrusions requiring hours or longer to restore service. Additionally, one-third of respondents saw revenue, data loss, compliance and brand-value impacted as a result of security intrusions.
• Ownership of OT security is not consistent across organizations. According to the Fortinet report, OT security management falls within a range of primarily director or manager roles, ranging from the Director of Plant Operations to Manager of Manufacturing Operations. Only 15% of survey respondents say that the CISO holds the responsibility for OT security at their organization.

• OT security is gradually improving, but security gaps still exist in many organizations. When asked about the maturity of their organization’s OT security posture, only 21% of organizations have reached level 4, which includes leveraging orchestration and management. Notably, a larger proportion of Latin America and APAC respondents have reached level 4 compared to other regions. More than 70% of organizations are in the middle levels toward having a mature OT security posture. At the same time, organizations face challenges with using multiple OT security tools, further creating gaps in their security posture. The report found that a vast majority of organizations use between two and eight different vendors for their industrial devices and have between 100 and 10,000 devices in operation, adding complexity.

OT Security is a Corporate-Level Concern
As OT systems increasingly become targets for cyber criminals, C-level leaders recognize the importance of securing these environments to mitigate risks to their organizations. Industrial systems have become a significant risk factor since these environments were traditionally air-gapped from IT and corporate networks, but now these two infrastructures are becoming universally integrated. With industrial systems now being connected to the internet and more accessible from anywhere, organizations’ attack surface is increasing significantly.

With the IT threat landscape becoming more sophisticated, connected OT systems have also become vulnerable to these growing threats. This combination of factors is moving industrial security upward in many organizations’ risk portfolio. OT security is a growing concern for executive leaders, increasing the need for organizations to move toward full protection of their industrial control system (ICS) and supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) systems.

Best Practices to Overcome OT Security Challenges
Fortinet’s global 2022 State of Operational Technology and Cybersecurity Report indicated ways organizations can address OT systems’ vulnerabilities and strengthen their overall security posture. Organizations can address their OT security challenges by:

• Establish Zero Trust Access to prevent breaches. With more industrial systems being connected to the network, Zero Trust Access solutions ensure that any user, device or applications without proper credentials and permissions are denied access to critical assets. To advance OT security efforts, Zero Trust Access solutions can further defend against both internal and external threats.
• Implementing solutions that provide centralized visibility of OT activities. Centralized, end-to-end visibility of all OT activities is key to ensuring organizations strengthen their security posture. According to Fortinet’s report, top-tier organizations – which make up the 6% of respondents who reported no intrusions in the past year – were more than three times as likely to have achieved centralized visibility than their counterparts who suffered intrusions.
• Consolidating security tools and vendors to integrate across environments. To remove complexity and help achieve centralized visibility of all devices, organizations should look to integrate their OT and IT technology across a smaller number of vendors. By implementing integrated security solutions, organizations can reduce their attack surface and improve their security posture.
• Deploying network access control (NAC) technology. Organizations that avoided intrusions in the past year were more likely to have role-based NAC in place, ensuring that only authorized individuals can access specific systems critical for securing digital assets.

Securing OT Environments with the Fortinet Security Fabric
For more than a decade, Fortinet has protected OT environments in critical infrastructure sectors such as energy, defense, manufacturing, food, and transportation. By designing security into complex infrastructure via the Fortinet Security Fabric, organizations have an efficient, non-disruptive way to ensure that their OT environment is protected and compliant. With full integration and shared threat intelligence, industrial organizations gain fast, automated responses to attacks in any vector. Fortinet’s Security Fabric covers the entire converged IT-OT network to close OT security gaps, deliver full visibility and provide simplified management.

About the Fortinet OT and Cybersecurity Survey:

• This year’s State of Operational Technology and Cybersecurity Report is based on a survey of more than 500 global OT professionals conducted in March 2022.
• The survey targeted people holding leadership positions responsible for OT and OT security, from managers to C-level executives. Respondents represent a range of industries that are heavy users of OT, including manufacturing, transportation and logistics, and healthcare.

Additional Resources

• Learn more about the Fortinet OT and Cybersecurity Survey in this blog.
• Learn more about securing critical infrastructures with Fortinet.
• Watch how Fortinet makes possible a digital world you can always trust, and view how the Fortinet Security Fabric platform delivers broad, integrated, and automated protection across an organization’s entire digital infrastructure.
• Read more about how Fortinet customers are securing their organizations.
• Learn more about FortiGuard Labs threat intelligence and research or Outbreak Alerts, which provide timely steps to mitigate breaking cybersecurity attacks. Read more about Fortinet’s FortiGuard security services portfolio.
• Learn more about Fortinet’s free cybersecurity training initiative, which includes broad cyber awareness and product training. As part of the Fortinet Training Advancement Agenda (TAA), the Fortinet Training Institute also provides training and certification through the Network Security Expert (NSE) Certification, Academic Partner, and Education Outreach programs.
• Engage in the Fortinet User Community (Fuse). Share ideas and feedback, learn more about our products and technology, and connect with peers.
• Follow Fortinet on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, and Instagram. Subscribe to Fortinet on YouTube.

About Fortinet
Fortinet (NASDAQ: FTNT) makes possible a digital world that we can always trust through its mission to protect people, devices, and data everywhere. This is why the world’s largest enterprises, service providers, and government organizations choose Fortinet to securely accelerate their digital journey. The Fortinet Security Fabric platform delivers broad, integrated, and automated protections across the entire digital attack surface, securing critical devices, data, applications, and connections from the data center to the cloud to the home office. Ranking #1 in the most security appliances shipped worldwide, more than 580,000 customers trust Fortinet to protect their businesses. And the Fortinet NSE Training Institute, an initiative of Fortinet’s Training Advancement Agenda (TAA), provides one of the largest and broadest training programs in the industry to make cyber training and new career opportunities available to everyone. Learn more at https://www.fortinet.com, the Fortinet Blog, or FortiGuard Labs.

Copyright © 2022 Fortinet, Inc. All rights reserved. The symbols ® and ™ denote respectively federally registered trademarks and common law trademarks of Fortinet, Inc., its subsidiaries and affiliates. Fortinet’s trademarks include, but are not limited to, the following: Fortinet, the Fortinet logo, FortiGate, FortiOS, FortiGuard, FortiCare, FortiAnalyzer, FortiManager, FortiASIC, FortiClient, FortiCloud, FortiCore, FortiMail, FortiSandbox, FortiADC, FortiAI, FortiAP, FortiAppEngine, FortiAppMonitor, FortiAuthenticator, FortiBalancer, FortiBIOS, FortiBridge, FortiCache, FortiCall, FortiCam, FortiCamera, FortiCarrier, FortiCASB, FortiCenter, FortiCentral, FortiConnect, FortiController, FortiConverter, FortiCWP, FortiDB, FortiDDoS, FortiDeceptor, FortiDirector, FortiDNS, FortiEDR, FortiExplorer, FortiExtender, FortiFirewall, FortiFone, FortiGSLB, FortiHypervisor, FortiInsight, FortiIsolator, FortiLocator, FortiLog, FortiMeter, FortiMoM, FortiMonitor, FortiNAC, FortiPartner, FortiPenTest, FortiPhish, FortiPortal, FortiPresence , FortiProtect, FortiProxy, FortiRecorder, FortiReporter, FortiSASE, FortiScan, FortiSDNConnector, FortiSIEM, FortiSDWAN, FortiSMS, FortiSOAR, FortiSwitch, FortiTester, FortiToken, FortiTrust, FortiVoice, FortiVoIP, FortiWAN, FortiWeb, FortiWiFi, FortiWLC, FortiWLCOS and FortiWLM.

Other trademarks belong to their respective owners. Fortinet has not independently verified statements or certifications herein attributed to third parties and Fortinet does not independently endorse such statements. Notwithstanding anything to the contrary herein, nothing herein constitutes a warranty, guarantee, contract, binding specification or other binding commitment by Fortinet or any indication of intent related to a binding commitment, and performance and other specification information herein may be unique to certain environments. This news release may contain forward-looking statements that involve uncertainties and assumptions, such as statements regarding technology releases among others. Changes of circumstances, product release delays, or other risks as stated in our filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, located at www.sec.gov, may cause results to differ materially from those expressed or implied in this press release. If the uncertainties materialize or the assumptions prove incorrect, results may differ materially from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements and assumptions. All statements other than statements of historical fact are statements that could be deemed forward-looking statements. Fortinet assumes no obligation to update any forward-looking statements, and expressly disclaims any obligation to update these forward-looking statements.

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Targeting Q1 ’23 Test Chip

Taipei, Taiwan, June 15, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Alchip Technologies today announced that its high-performance computing ASIC services are now taking 3nm designs and targeting its first test chip for Q1 2023.

The company will unveil its chiplet technology at the TSMC North America Technology Symposium on Thursday, June 16.

Alchip becomes the first dedicated high-performance ASIC company to announce total design readiness of their design and production ecosystem.  The new service targets TSMC’s latest N3E process technology.

The company revealed that it completed its design technology and infrastructure during the current quarter and will make available its design methodology within a couple of weeks.  Other assets in place include a complete library of best-in-class 3rd party IP covering DDR5, GDDR6, HBM2E, HBM3, PCIe5, and 112G SERDES IP from Tier 1 providers.

Alchip earlier announced to select customers the availability of its 3nm MCM, CoWoS and InFO advanced packaging capabilities and its latest APLink 5.0 (Advanced Package Link) die-to-die IP that is UCle 1.0 compatible.

“We have made it a priority to be ready with the most advanced process technologies when the high-performance computing market pushes the envelope for next generation cloud computing, artificial intelligence, and machine learning applications,” said President and CEO Johnny Shen.

4nm Test Chip Tape-out Next Quarter
Alchip also revealed that its first 4nm test chip, targeting TSMC’s N4P process technology will be taped out early in August.  Design methodology, design technology and infrastructure and test chips specification had all been finalized at the end of last year. APLink 4.0 supports N5/N4P die-to-die connection for advanced packaging designs.

Alchip is traded on the Taiwan Stock Exchange, with Global Repository Receipts trading on the Luxembourg Exchange.  The Company is extremely well respected in North America, Japan, Israel, and Asia for its high-performance ASIC design methodology, flexible business model, best-in-class IP portfolio and advanced packaging technology expertise.

For a more information on Alchip, go to www.alchip.com

About Alchip

Alchip Technologies Ltd., headquartered in Taipei, Taiwan, is a leading global provider of silicon design and production services for system companies developing complex and high-volume ASICs and SoCs.   The Company was founded by semiconductor veterans from Silicon Valley and Japan in 2003 and provides faster time-to-market and cost-effective solutions for SoC design at mainstream and advanced, including 7nm processes. Customers include global leaders in AI, HPC/supercomputer, mobile phones, entertainment device, networking equipment and other electronic product categories. Alchip is listed on the Taiwan Stock Exchange (TWSE: 3661) and is a TSMC-certified Value Chain Aggregator.

Attachment

• Alchip Design Technology Roadmap 

Charles Byers
Alchip Technolgies 
+ (408) 310-9244
chuck_byers@alchip.com

A scientific paper recently published in Nature Biotechnology reveals new research regarding how we track and monitor T-cell patients’ immunity to SARS-CoV-2, leveraging the unique characteristics of Hyris System™. The study results from a joint effort of an international research team from the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, Singapore Duke-NUS Medical School, laboratory diagnostic service providers Synlab, and Hyris.

LONDON, June 15, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — With over 460 million global cases thus far, 6 million of which have resulted in death, the COVID-19 pandemic from SARS-CoV-2 proved to be a dire health crisis on a global scale. In this concerning scenario, the unprecedented effort by the international scientific community is even more remarkable and led – in record time – to the deployment of mRNA and viral vector-based vaccines. With more than 10 billion total vaccine doses administered worldwide, vaccination campaigns have already started to attenuate this global crisis. In order to maximize vaccine effectiveness, the efficacy and duration of protective immunity will need to be systematically assessed and monitored as widely as possible.

A team of internationally renowned medical scientists recently published a related paper in Nature Biotechnology, addressing the efficacy and sensitivity of a new type of assay to detect SARS-CoV-2 cellular immunity.

“To date, antibody tests have been the typical, if not the only clinical endpoints commonly used to measure the immune response to SARS-CoV-2,” explains Antonio Bertoletti, Professor at Duke-NUS Medical School. “Both the humoral (antibodies) and cellular immune response act in coordination to achieve long-term protection from viral infections. Antibodies are important for preventing infection, protecting the body from disease, while cellular immunity is essential to eliminate virus-infected cells, thus helping to fight the disease itself,” concludes Professor Bertoletti.

Therefore, according to the study, measuring the T-cells’ response is a new disruptive approach to fighting SARS-CoV-2. An individual negative to an antibody test could still be protected thanks to responsive T-cells.

This new study thus shows the relevance of a quantitative PCR approach to T-cell testing, thanks to the joint effort with SYNLAB, one of the world’s leading providers of laboratory diagnostic services, and Hyris, a global biotech company focused on AI-powered genetic analysis.

The research leveraged Hyris’ signature technology, the disruptive Hyris System™.

“These highly scalable screening methods will be particularly important, to monitor the magnitude and duration of functional cellular immunity towards emerging variants, thus helping to prioritize revaccination strategies in vulnerable populations,” states Cristina Lapucci, Head of Genetics and Molecular Biology at SYNLAB Italy.

“We have been very committed to putting our System at such prestigious partners’ service,” says Stefano Lo Priore, Founder and CEO at Hyris. “Many medical institutions worldwide already adopted our technology, embracing the unprecedented simplicity, connectivity, and scalability of the Hyris System^TM.”

The rapid deployment of SARS-CoV-2 vaccines to a large proportion of the population now suggests new approaches to measure the duration of the immune response, and the potential need for vaccine boosters should be evaluated.

“The assays used in our study rely on the quantification of CXCL10 mRNA after incubation of whole blood with SARS-CoV-2 specific peptides. The levels of induced CXCL10 transcripts correlate robustly with the IFN-gamma produced by activated antigen-specific T cells, serving as a proxy to detect cellular immunity in COVID-19 recovered and SARS-CoV-2 vaccinated subjects,” points out Ernesto Guccione, PhD, Professor of Oncological Sciences, and Pharmacological Sciences, at Icahn Mount Sinai.

“This is particularly important after the emergence of SARS-CoV-2 variants like Omicron that evade most of the neutralizing ability of antibodies, but not that of T-cells,” continues Megan Schwarz, a graduate student at Icahn School Mount Sinai and first author of the manuscript. “Precise measurement of cellular responses underlying virus protection, therefore, represents a crucial parameter of immune defence.”

“The solutions already present on the market are usually performed based on the traditional fluorescence methodologies typically used in the immunological domain,” adds Jordi Ochando, PhD, Assistant Professor of Oncological Sciences, Medicine (Nephrology), and Pathology, Molecular, and Cell-Based Medicine at Icahn Mount Sinai. “This research demonstrates that CXCL10 mRNA expression confirms data obtained with traditional methods (i.e., ELISpot) compared with naïve, COVID-19 convalescent and SARS-CoV-2 vaccinated subject,” he concludes.

This study could prove a key solution to further support the scientific community playing a strategic role in facing this global challenge.

Contact a Hyris expert to discover how to perform beyond your current diagnostic capability at info@hyris.net.

Related Images

Image 1: Hyris keeps supporting T cells Research

3D rendering of a T-cell attacking a Coronavirus. Hyris is committed to supporting the immunology sector, as the new frontier in the fight against COVID-19 and other pathologies

This content was issued through the press release distribution service at Newswire.com.

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• Hyris keeps supporting T cells Research

‘Value Creation in the Metaverse’ report examines the massive, global impact of the metaverse across key sectors and businesses

NEW YORK and LONDON and PARIS, June 15, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — McKinsey & Company released its new report “Value creation in the metaverse,” which shows the metaverse may be too big to ignore. McKinsey’s preliminary forecast shows the metaverse has the potential to grow up to $5 trillion in value by 2030. It shows e-commerce as the largest economic force ($2.6 trillion), ahead of sectors such as virtual learning ($270 billion), advertising ($206 billion), and gaming ($125 billion).

As companies of all different shapes and sizes look to enter the metaverse, this extensive report provides a clear view of what the metaverse is and is not, what first movers are doing, what’s fueling the investment, and the potential for consumer and B2B companies.

The report builds on multiple proprietary insights and analysis, including a survey of more than 3,400 consumers and executives on adoption of the metaverse, its potential, and its likely impact on behavior. The researchers also interviewed metaverse builders and industry experts.

“The metaverse represents a strategic inflection point for companies, and it presents a significant opportunity to influence the way we live, connect, learn, innovate, and collaborate,” said Eric Hazan, senior partner, McKinsey & Company. “Our ambition is to help leaders of both consumer and B2B companies better understand its power and potential, identify strategic imperatives, and act as a force for its evolution.”

What’s fueling the metaverse investment
Already this year, companies, venture capital, and private equity firms have invested more than $120 billion in the metaverse—more than double the $57 billion invested in all of last year.

Multiple factors are driving this investor enthusiasm:

• ongoing technological advances across the infrastructure required to power the metaverse
• demographic tailwinds
• increasingly consumer-led brand marketing and engagement
• increasing marketplace readiness as users explore today’s version of the metaverse, which is largely driven by gaming while applications emerge in socializing, fitness, commerce, virtual learning, and other uses

Already, more than three billion gamers worldwide have access to different versions of the metaverse.

“While the idea of connecting virtually has been decades in the making, it is now increasingly real, meaning real people are using it and spending real money and companies are betting big,” said Lareina Yee, senior partner, McKinsey & Company. “Yet this booming interest has made it difficult to separate hype from reality. It’s worth remembering that while the bust of the first dot-com boom resulted in the disappearance of scores of companies, the internet itself went from strength to strength, giving rise to new entrants.”

Consumers are already engaging in the metaverse
Consumers are already there. McKinsey’s research shows consumers are excited about transitioning life into the metaverse, with almost six in ten (59%) consumers preferring at least one metaverse experience over its physical alternative.

Among those consumers, certain types of activities stand out for being most preferred in the immersive world:

• shopping—purchasing physical or virtual goods (79%)
• attending virtual social events or playing social games (78%)
• exercising using virtual reality (76%)

Senior leaders believe the metaverse will have a significant impact on their industry
Business leaders see the metaverse’s potential to drive impact and margin growth. Ninety-five percent of leaders say they expect the metaverse to have a positive impact on their industry within five to ten years, with 31 percent saying the metaverse will fundamentally change the way their industry operates. More significantly, a quarter of leaders expect the metaverse technology to drive more than 15 percent of their organization’s total margin growth in the next five years.

“The metaverse has put us at the cusp of the next wave of digital disruption,” said Tarek Elmasry, senior partner, McKinsey & Company. “It’s transformative. It will likely have a major impact on our commercial and personal lives, which is why businesses, policy makers, consumers, and citizens may want to explore and understand as much as they can about this phenomenon, the technology that will underpin it, and the ramifications it could have for our economies and wider society.”

For more insights and to read the full report, please click here.

About the report
McKinsey surveyed more than 3,400 consumers and senior executives across Asia–Pacific, China, Europe, and the United States to gain insight into the habits of current metaverse users—their motivations, what they are doing, and what they expect to do. In analyzing the metaverse’s value-creation potential and total investment landscape, we examined the drivers of activity among major corporations, venture capital, and private-equity funds. We examined the potential impact of the metaverse on sectors most closely tied to its technology and uses, supplementing our work with additional research, case studies, and real-world examples. The report also includes an in-depth analysis of five industries: apparel, fashion, and luxury; consumer packaged goods; financial services; retail; and telecommunications, media, and technology.

About McKinsey & Company
McKinsey & Company is a global management consulting firm committed to helping organizations realize sustainable, inclusive growth. We work with clients across the private, public, and social sectors to solve complex problems and create positive change for all their stakeholders. We combine bold strategies and transformative technologies to help organizations innovate more sustainably, achieve lasting gains in performance, and build workforces that will thrive for in this generation and the next.

About Growth, Marketing & Sales, McKinsey & Company
The mission of McKinsey’s Growth, Marketing & Sales Practice is to help leaders of both consumer and business-to-business clients create Growth That Matters through meaningful transformations and marketing-driven profit. The practice helps its clients set their strategic direction, develop their marketing and sales capabilities, and connect their organization to realize the full potential of today’s omnichannel opportunities. Clients benefit from McKinsey’s experience in core areas of growth, marketing and sales such as growth strategy, branding, customer insights, marketing ROI, digital marketing, CLM, pricing, and sales and channel management.

For more information, please contact
US media contact: MaryLiz Ghanem, DiGennaro Communications, McKinsey-DiGennaro@digennaro-usa.com, +1 917 518 8422

UK media contact: Ruth Jones, 3THINKRS, mckinsey@3thinkrs.com, +44 0208 0872843