Use Case — OT Cybersecurity
When your factory floor becomes a cyber target
Industrial environments were never designed with cybersecurity in mind. Today, they're connected to corporate networks, accessed remotely, and increasingly governed by legislation originally written for IT. For many organisations, the gap between where they are and where they need to be is significant — and the risks are very real.
The challenges we see
Why OT security is different
IT running inside OT — with no clear owner
Standard IT components are increasingly deployed in OT environments, yet responsibility for managing them is often split or undefined between ICT, OT teams, and third parties.
Systems that never go offline
OT environments run 24/7. Maintenance windows are rare, patches don't get applied, and shared accounts stay in place for years — because stopping the line isn't an option.
Third-party access without governance
Vendors and integrators often retain remote access long after installation. Their own security maturity varies widely — and their access is rarely properly scoped or monitored.
Decentralised decision-making
In manufacturing, each plant often selects its own OT vendor and solution. The result is fragmented environments with no common baseline for security or risk management.
Legacy connectivity
Environments built for isolation are now connected to corporate systems for reporting and cost optimisation — widening the attack surface without proportional security controls.
New legislation, old infrastructure
NIS2 and Belgium's Cyber Fundamentals framework now explicitly cover OT. Many organisations are being assessed on environments that have never had a formal security programme.
NIS2 and local frameworks like Cyber Fundamentals (Belgium) apply to OT environments — not just IT. If your organisation operates critical infrastructure or manufacturing, compliance is no longer optional.
Our approach
How Cybervalue approaches this
We take a pragmatic, business-first approach. You can't rip and replace an OT environment overnight — and you don't need to. What you need is a clear picture of where your real risks are, and a structured path to address them.
Start with the business conversation
Before any technical assessment, we talk to the people who run the operation. What's your maximum acceptable downtime? What are the health, safety, and environmental implications of a breach? We capture this in plain language — no jargon required.
Risk-qualify your OT environments
We score every environment across three dimensions: business criticality, current level of cyber protection, and actual threat exposure. This tells you exactly where to focus first — and why.
Apply the Dome approach
Rather than trying to change everything inside the OT environment at once, we secure all ingress and egress points first. Every connection in and out is controlled — including third-party remote access. The inside can be improved gradually, without operational disruption.
Centralise and standardise
We help organisations move from a site-by-site patchwork to a centralised OT security model — unified risk management, consistent third-party governance, and security requirements scaled to the importance and risk level of each environment.
Align to NIS2 and relevant legislation
Our approach maps directly to current regulatory requirements. We help you document, demonstrate, and continuously improve your OT security posture in a way that satisfies auditors and genuinely reduces risk.
Where we've done this
Not sure where your OT environments stand?
Let's start with a conversation — no slide decks required.