(c) WISTO, Tina Blaser
Cyber threats such as data theft, hacker attacks or blackmail via ransomware are now among the biggest business risks. A failure of IT systems not only costs a lot of time, money, reputation and nerves, but can also lead to the production standstill of factories or the failure of infrastructures. Not only large companies, public authorities or other organizations are affected, but also small and medium-sized enterprises are targeted by hacker groups. In addition, cyberattacks are used as a means of de-stabilizing society or in modern warfare with life-threatening consequences, as the recent past has shown.
In case of emergency, everything happens very quickly. Within minutes, cyber- and information-focused attacks are used to change websites, paralyze digital services and systems, steal or encrypt data, damage machines and bring the entire business to a standstill. Such a scenario formed the basis of a special cybersecurity exercise conducted at the Vorarlberg University of Applied Sciences (FHV) in Dornbirn on June 9, 2022. Communicative and technical measures were trained on the basis of a fictitious, simulated company group. IT technicians and IT managers from 18 Vorarlberg companies of various sizes and sectors as well as from public institutions were involved. Several cyber security teams identified the attacks and initiated successful countermeasures. After a few hours, normal operations could be restored in the simulated company network.
TRAINING IN ONE OF THE MOST MODERN SIMULATION ENVIRONMENTS FOR IT SECURITY
The cybersecurity exercise was carried out by Digital Factory Vorarlberg in cooperation with AIT Austrian Institute of Technology, FHV and Wirtschafts-Standort Vorarlberg (WISTO) as part of the Digital Innovation Hub West (DIH-West). The "AIT Cyber Range", one of the most modern IT simulation environments for cyber security exercises, was used as the exercise platform.
In the "AIT Cyber Range", IT infrastructures and communication processes are realistically simulated; the detection and defense against cyber attacks can thus be trained for small and large companies or organizations, but also production facilities or critical infrastructures. This also makes it possible to simulate extreme situations and emergencies that are not possible, for example, in real production environments or during a company's ongoing operations for security or cost reasons. In this way, structures and processes can be analyzed and sources of error can be determined. The effects of the actions and reactions taken can be reliably and transparently tracked and used as a basis for process improvements. As part of the cyber security exercise in Dornbirn, the "AIT Cyber Range" was also used for the first time specifically for training small and manufacturing companies.
Further information about the AIT Cyber Range: https://cyberrange.at/
Further information on Digital Factory Vorarlberg: https://vactory.at
Press contact:
Mag. (FH) Michael W. Mürling
Marketing and Communications
AIT Austrian Institute of Technology
Center for Digital Safety & Security
T +43 (0)664 235 17 47
michael.muerling(at)ait.ac.at I www.ait.ac.at
Dr. Robert Merz
Research Director
Digital Factory Vorarlberg GmbH
T +43 (0)5572 792 3031