Single Sign-On for Belden Horizon: IT-Secure, OT-Friendly
Single Sign-On for Belden Horizon: IT-Secure, OT-Friendly
Are you tired of remembering 20 different login credentials to do your job effectively? Is IT worried about another OT solution that they will need to manage? (Or worse, that they have no control over, which poses a security risk for the entire organization.) As the plant’s operational manager, are you worried about IT pushing back against a remote access solution that you need to ensure there is no downtime?
OT and IT professionals can finally allay their fears! Belden Horizon™ is the Remote Connectivity platform that is IT-secure and OT-friendly. Belden Horizon has multiple levels of security, in line with its defense-in-depth strategy. In this blog post, we will focus on the Single Sign-On feature and its benefits to both IT and OT.
What’s Single Sign-On?
Let’s start by understanding what Single Sign-On (SSO) means and how it works.
SSO allows users to access multiple networked applications using one set of credentials. So, for example, if your company has specific portals for HR, training, time sheets, intranet, investor information, a production dashboard, and many others, then as a user you will be able to access all of these portals using one set of login credentials. Easy, right? From an OT perspective, this is definitely easy – no more password weariness.
At a very high level, SSO works as follows:
Clearly, SSO helps OT. But, is SSO secure? In one word – absolutely. Why?
SSO allows IT to manage user and application access. SSO simplifies one of the main IT tasks – managing user access. Now, if they have to add a user or terminate access – they can do so from a centralized database rather than having to implement a policy and procedure in place for each application that the organization uses.
SSO, combined with two-factor authentication, improves identity protection. Another IT advantage of SSO is that it reduces their workload. Imagine not having to deal with hundreds of password reset requests – especially at 4 p.m. on a Friday!
Remember that Belden Horizon has multiple levels of security – from Virtual Lockout-Tagout™, to 256-bit AES encryption to digitally signed firmware to Single Sign-On and many more! These security features, collectively known as defense-in-depth, ensure that Belden Horizon is the remote connectivity solution that is OT-friendly and IT-secure.
Reduced downtime and cost control is just as important as organizational security – Belden Horizon will help you achieve that.