Skip to content

Agentic AI in OT: The Ultimate Insider Threat

Table of Contents

Presenter:

Ian Bramson

This talk argues that OT security efforts fail because organizations underestimate how interconnected and exposed their environments have become—especially as IT/OT convergence expands the attack surface.

Key takeaways

  • IT/OT convergence expands risk
    • Increased connectivity between business systems and industrial systems
    • More pathways for attackers to move laterally
    • Traditional boundaries no longer hold
  • Exposure grows faster than defenses
    • New connections are added for efficiency and visibility
    • Security controls don’t keep pace
    • Attack surface quietly expands over time
  • Perimeter thinking is outdated
    • There is no clear “inside vs. outside” anymore
    • Trust assumptions break down in interconnected environments
    • Attackers don’t need to break in—they move through
  • Operational impact is the real risk
    • Disruption to availability and safety is the primary concern
    • Incidents affect physical processes, not just data
    • This raises stakes beyond traditional cybersecurity models
  • Defense needs to follow connectivity
    • Visibility across IT and OT environments
    • Segmentation aligned to real workflows
    • Monitoring that reflects how systems actually interact

Latest