10 3 Final Project Essay

Submitted By Appala-Raj
Words: 2507
Pages: 11

Implementation of a Computer Network Security for a Production / Manufacturing Industry.

Abstract
This implementation of Computer network security for a manufacturing company is challenge in this growing competitive market. Enterprises employ hundreds of employees working in various departments at various locations through an established intranet for the organization. Many industries are in lack of Information security system which affects the business of the organization in various factors. The information system is used by the various departments like HR and Admin, design, inventory, and production, Planning and quality departments. The maintainability and confidentiality and integrity of data are the challenging task. Companies really have to implement Information Security & Effective implementation of security policy will helps the organization to solve the issues related to the user access and authentication.
Introduction
This paper starts with examining about how manufacturing industry computer network encounters security threats and the vulnerabilities currently facing in organization’s Wireless LAN and mobile computing networks and also examine threats in real time shop floor production and process control systems, how to secure the network from these type of attacks using operational security systems and other solutions to protect organization networks. Some detailed discussions about distributed firewall and its advantages. Why organizations should have an Information Security policy and adopt security standards.

Security threats of Wireless LAN:
Wireless LAN is common in today industrial and business environment due to various reasons the wireless network can be installed easily and it is scalable, the advantages of the mobility, flexibility and Total cost of Ownership. Wireless networks are implemented by many industries due to its advantages. Rapid adoption of mobile computing for business environment is quite common. Smart phones and tablets in this integrated and interconnected enterprise environment leads to another security threat for this type of industry. Mobility becomes advantages in terms to increase employee productivity, improve client service and reduce IT cost. In this situation companies to need to revisit its security policy and treat the wireless devices like smartphone, tablet and laptops as like any other IT equipment with proper security control. Employees and external vendors who are visiting the industry tend to use these devices for both business and personal data and it has become a really a big challenge for the IT Administrators.
Several new standards are adopted in wireless LAN network to improve security. IEEE 802.1x have three separate sections P2P protocols, EAP & the popular wireless network standard 802.1x. This 802.11i plays an important role to increase the comprehensive security capabilities due to its distribution & encryption features. In 2003, the author Abdul Hamid’s study states that the security threats are most common in Wireless LAN and some of the threats are Denial of Service [DoS], Spoofing, and Eavesdropping. Intruders deluge wanted and unwanted messages creates drop in bit rate in to network and launch attacks like DoS. Attack like DoS will influence the availability of network resources. Many wireless networks are susceptible to spoofing attacks is a common type of identity theft, the attacker spoof device MAC address to intrude the network and identify themselves as a valid user to get network access to data and vital resources. The problem is due to in networks like 802.11, the source address will not be authenticated. Networks can be secured from spoofing by appropriate authentication & also mechanism to right access control to be incorporated in the wireless LAN. Eavesdropping is another type of attack on confidentiality of transmitted data. The data transmitted in air through the radiated wireless network, the intruder use this