There’s a narrative in the industry that traditional cybersecurity solutions are ineffective in modern environments. Like any narratives which have caught on, this too has some truth in it. The reality is that traditional cybersecurity solutions only become ineffective when the environments they’re meant to protect fundamentally change.
Take modern industrial networks. They blend enterprise IT systems with OT (operational technology) that directly controls production equipment, creating a complex ecosystem. So how can a security tool built for either IT or OT truly secure something that is both?
Most solutions are designed to excel at what they were built for: identifying threats, blocking them, and removing them. And they do that well. But in manufacturing environments, the real challenge isn’t always a visible threat actively affecting your systems. Sometimes, the danger hides (and moves) in plain sight.
When IT and OT operate on the same network, communication between internal systems (machines, controllers, servers) can go unmonitored. If there’s no obvious breach or immediate anomaly, SOC teams have no way of knowing whether something is wrong.
And it’s in that gray area that attackers thrive.
Imagine an attacker gains access to your network through a successful phishing attack. The resulting lateral movement, gaining access across interconnected production systems, can remain largely invisible until it’s too late. By the time SOC teams catch on, attackers may have already penetrated everything that matters.
This is the visibility gap our customer set out to close, with MetaDefender NDR at the core of their approach.
Traditional Security Monitoring Left Critical Network Activity Unseen
Our customer’s core issue was their lack of visibility.
While they had solutions in place to detect initial intrusions or late-stage anomalies, their SOC teams did not have the tools to monitor lateral movement across an interconnected IT/OT network. This led to a couple of issues which could have escalated into serious consequences, should a breach have occurred.
Lateral movement went unnoticed
Attackers could disguise lateral movement into legitimate network traffic and navigate between interconnected systems without triggering traditional detection mechanisms.
Reduced monitoring effectiveness
The blend of IT and OT created complex communication patterns, where lateral movements could easily be confused with traffic generated by factory operations, industrial devices, and enterprise applications. As a result, if the network were breached, attackers could hide in plain sight while attempting to gain further access to production networks, intellectual property, or sensitive operational data.
Delayed threat detection
By the time SOC teams detected suspicious behaviours, attackers could have already reached critical production systems, leading to operational risk exposure.
Implementing OPSWAT MetaDefender NDR to Strengthen Cyber Resilience
To eliminate these visibility gaps, the organization deployed MetaDefender NDR across strategic segments of its manufacturing and enterprise networks.
MetaDefender NDR uncovers command-and-control communications associated with cyberattacks. It does so by analysing network telemetry to identify abnormal traffic patterns and detect lateral movement between systems.
With its AI-assisted detection models, it continuously analyses network behaviours to identify subtle anomalies that may indicate attacker activity earlier in the attack lifecycle. The deployment focused on solving three core issues.
Network visibility expansion
Sensors deployed at network aggregation points enabled the SOC teams to observe communications between production systems, enterprise applications, and external connections.
For the first time, analysts gained a unified view of network activity across the organization’s manufacturing infrastructure.
Earlier detection of attacker behaviour
Behavioural analytics combined with integrated threat intelligence and AI-driven anomaly detection enabled the SOC team to identify suspicious activity associated with attacker movement inside the network.
Previously hidden communication patterns were now detected earlier in the attack lifecycle.
Faster security investigations
MetaDefender NDR provided detailed network telemetry and contextual threat intelligence that allowed SOC analysts to quickly investigate suspicious activity.
Instead of correlating fragmented alerts across multiple systems, analysts could investigate incidents using a comprehensive network-level view of potential threats.
Measurable Impact on SOC Visibility and Operational Security
With MetaDefender NDR, our customer significantly improved its ability to detect and investigate suspicious network activity earlier in the attack lifecycle.
| Area of Impact | Measurable Outcome |
|---|---|
| Network visibility | Deep visibility into communications across manufacturing and enterprise networks. |
| Threat detection speed | Earlier identification of suspicious traffic and lateral movement. |
| Investigation efficiency | Faster root cause analysis for SOC analysts. |
| Operational protection | Improved protection of production systems and industrial infrastructure. |
| Incident response | Better coordination across security operations teams. |
| Compliance readiness | Enhanced monitoring aligned with industrial cybersecurity standards. |
Driving Proactive Cyber Defence for Modern Manufacturing Organizations
Cyberthreats targeting manufacturing organizations aren’t standing still. Cybercriminals are constantly looking for ways into valuable intellectual property and critical production systems.
Organizations in manufacturing don’t just need to stop attackers at the entry point. They need continuous visibility into what’s happening inside the network, across both IT and OT.
With MetaDefender NDR in place, our customer has taken a meaningful step forward toward proactive cybersecurity. Their SOC teams can now access the required insights to spot hidden threats, investigate unusual activity more quickly, and respond before issues escalate into real disruptions.
For manufacturers protecting with safeguarding production and intellectual property, having that level of visibility and behavioral threat detection is essential.
If you’re also in manufacturing and have identified visibility issues in your environments, let’s chat and see if MetaDefender NDR can work for you as well.
