FPGA vs. CPU - What is the difference
SCADA = Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition
SCADA is part of the broad category of ICS (Industrial Control Systems); part of its job is to provide a human interface to industrial processes, but it can also just be concerned with internal data collection or automation. SCADA is not so much a “standard” in the IT-sense of the word as a “standardized way of handling and displaying information and connections between industrial systems”, which may be highly eccentric and proprietary under the hood.
ICS systems are generally touchy, and as such standard “hands-on” security practices often don’t work well. Physical external and internal segmentation and one-way data flows are the primary security mechanisms used for ICS.
The Exam Cram apparently considers the Roomba the first widely-used home automation system!
How to find out if home automation is vulnerable to public attack? The Exam Cram recommends Shodan!
Another mention of “Zigbee” as a home automation tool. Apparently this actually is an IEEE standard for the creation of “wireless personal area networks” (WPANs) - think Bluetooth, but shorter range, lower data rate, and lower power.
“Multifunction devices” are somewhat confusingly abbreviated as MFDs. Basically, this is a fancy name for printer/copier/scanner/fax units.
The Exam Cram defines “special-purpose devices” as single-processor, industry-specific devices that are designed for only a single function (which often means running a single, embedded, program).
While the potential for medical device hacks generate a lot of (very real and justified!) concern, the statistics provided by the Exam Cram indicate that < 0.5% of medical devices are actually publicly discoverable on the internet.
Apparently, internal device communications within automobiles is all plaintext, which is a problem when systems connected to the vehicle CAN (controller area network) are then connected to the internet as a whole.
This section reminds me of a trilemma I coined during a discussion with other members of the Yak Collective:
I later posted that to Twitter, and came up with a pithier corollary:
Secure, fast, inexpensive: Pick two. (Corollary to Necopinus’ Trilemma) (Twitter)
So it goes.