Why Manufacturing Is a Prime Cyber Target
If you run a manufacturing business, you might think cybersecurity is mainly a concern for banks, tech companies, and government agencies. That assumption is dangerous — and increasingly outdated. Manufacturing is now one of the most targeted sectors for cyber attacks globally, and Australian manufacturers are not immune.
Here is why attackers love targeting manufacturers:
Downtime is devastating. When a manufacturer’s systems go down, production stops. Orders do not get filled. Supply chains break. Every hour of downtime costs real money — and attackers know this, which makes manufacturers more likely to pay ransoms quickly.
Legacy systems are everywhere. Manufacturing environments often run equipment and control systems that are decades old. These systems were designed for reliability and longevity, not cybersecurity. Many run outdated operating systems that no longer receive security patches.
IT and OT convergence creates new risks. Operational Technology (OT) — the systems that control physical machinery, production lines, and industrial processes — is increasingly connected to IT networks and the internet. This connectivity brings efficiency gains but also creates attack paths that did not exist when the factory floor was air-gapped from the front office.
Supply chain pressure. Manufacturers sit in the middle of complex supply chains. A breach at a manufacturer can cascade to customers and suppliers, making manufacturers an attractive stepping stone for attackers targeting larger organisations.
The Real-World Threats Facing Australian Manufacturers
Let us be specific about what you are up against. These are not hypothetical scenarios — they are the attacks that are happening to Australian manufacturers right now.
Ransomware
Ransomware is the number one threat. An attacker gains access to your network, encrypts your files and systems, and demands payment (usually in cryptocurrency) for the decryption key. For manufacturers, this often means production systems are locked, ERP data is inaccessible, and operations grind to a halt.
The attack vector is usually mundane: a phishing email that an employee clicks on, a compromised remote desktop connection, or an unpatched vulnerability in an internet-facing system. The damage, however, is anything but mundane. Recovery from a ransomware attack typically takes weeks, even with good backups. Without good backups, it can be catastrophic.
Business Email Compromise (BEC)
BEC attacks target the financial processes of a business. An attacker impersonates a supplier, a customer, or a senior executive and convinces someone to redirect a payment, change bank details, or approve a fraudulent invoice. Manufacturers are particularly vulnerable because they deal with large purchase orders, regular supplier payments, and long-standing business relationships that attackers can exploit.
Intellectual Property Theft
Your designs, formulations, processes, customer lists, and pricing structures are valuable — and they are targets. State-sponsored attackers and competitors may target your systems to steal intellectual property. This is particularly relevant for manufacturers working in defence, advanced materials, food production, or any sector where proprietary knowledge is a competitive advantage.
Supply Chain Attacks
Attackers may target your suppliers or software vendors as a way to reach you. A compromised update from a trusted vendor, a breached supplier portal, or a poisoned component in your supply chain can give attackers access to your systems without directly attacking you.
The Unique Challenge: IT vs OT Security
This is where manufacturing cybersecurity gets genuinely complex. Most businesses only need to worry about IT security — computers, servers, cloud services, email. Manufacturers also need to worry about OT security — the systems that control physical processes.
IT systems (your office computers, ERP, email, file servers) follow standard cybersecurity practices: patching, antivirus, firewalls, MFA, backups.
OT systems (PLCs, SCADA, HMIs, CNC machines, industrial IoT sensors) are a different beast entirely. They often run proprietary software, cannot be easily patched without risking production disruption, have long lifecycles (15-25 years), and were designed in an era when cybersecurity was not a consideration.
The critical issue is the convergence of these two worlds. When your ERP system talks to your production line, when your CNC machines are accessible from the office network, when your industrial IoT sensors report data to a cloud dashboard — these connections create pathways that attackers can exploit to move from the IT environment into the OT environment, or vice versa.
A ransomware attack that starts with a phishing email in the front office can, if the network is not properly segmented, reach the factory floor and shut down production systems.
Practical Steps to Secure Your Manufacturing Business
Here is what you can do — practical, prioritised steps that do not require a massive budget or a dedicated security team.
Step 1: Segment Your Network
This is the single most important thing most manufacturers can do. Separate your IT network (office computers, email, internet access) from your OT network (production systems, industrial controllers, factory floor devices). Use firewalls and VLANs to create boundaries so that a compromise in one zone cannot easily spread to another.
If an attacker gets into a staff member’s email, network segmentation ensures they cannot jump from there to your production control systems. This is not a luxury — it is a necessity.
Step 2: Implement the Essential Eight
The Essential Eight cybersecurity strategies apply to manufacturers just as much as any other business. Start with the basics: patch your systems, enforce multi-factor authentication, restrict admin privileges, and ensure your backups are comprehensive and tested. These controls address the vast majority of common attack techniques.
Step 3: Secure Remote Access
Many manufacturers have remote access configured for maintenance vendors, machine suppliers, or IT support. Every remote access point is a potential entry for attackers. Audit all remote access connections, disable any that are not actively needed, enforce MFA on all that remain, and monitor access logs for unusual activity.
Default passwords on remote access tools are still disturbingly common in manufacturing environments. Change them. All of them.
Step 4: Inventory Your OT Assets
You cannot protect what you do not know about. Create a comprehensive inventory of all OT devices, including: what they are, what software/firmware they run, how they connect to the network, and who has access to them. Many manufacturers are surprised by how many connected devices they have when they actually count them.
Step 5: Train Your People
Phishing remains the most common way attackers get into manufacturing networks. Your factory floor workers, office staff, and management all need regular cybersecurity awareness training. This does not need to be complicated — focus on: recognising phishing emails, not clicking suspicious links, verifying payment change requests through a separate channel, and reporting anything unusual immediately.
Make reporting easy and judgment-free. You want staff to report a suspicious email, not hide it because they are embarrassed they clicked on it.
Step 6: Plan for Ransomware
Assume you will be targeted and plan accordingly. This means: comprehensive, tested backups that are stored offline or in an immutable format (so ransomware cannot encrypt them too), a documented incident response plan that covers both IT and OT systems, insurance that covers cyber incidents (and make sure you meet the conditions), and relationships with incident response providers who can help if the worst happens.
Step 7: Manage Your Vendors
Your machine suppliers, maintenance contractors, and software vendors all have some level of access to your systems. Manage this access actively: review and revoke access that is no longer needed, require vendors to meet minimum security standards, monitor vendor access sessions, and include cybersecurity requirements in vendor contracts.
Common Mistakes Manufacturers Make
“Our factory systems are air-gapped.” They almost certainly are not — not anymore. That USB stick someone used to update the CNC machine software? That Wi-Fi access point someone added to the break room that happens to be on the same network? That new IoT sensor reporting to a cloud dashboard? Air gaps are rarely as airtight as people think.
“We are too small to be a target.” Automated attacks do not care how big you are. Ransomware operators use bots that scan the internet for vulnerable systems. They are not manually selecting targets — they are casting a wide net and hitting whoever is exposed.
“Our IT provider handles security.” Maybe. But do they understand OT environments? Do they know the difference between patching a Windows server and managing updates on an industrial controller? IT security and OT security are related but distinct disciplines. Make sure your provider has the right expertise for both.
“We cannot patch our production systems.” This is sometimes true — some OT systems genuinely cannot be patched without vendor involvement or production downtime. But that is not an excuse to do nothing. Compensating controls (network segmentation, access restrictions, monitoring) can protect unpatchable systems until they can be updated or replaced.
How TechAssist Supports Manufacturers
At TechAssist, we have extensive experience working with manufacturers across Melbourne and regional Victoria. We understand the unique challenges of securing environments where IT and OT converge, where legacy systems coexist with modern cloud platforms, and where downtime has an immediate financial impact.
Our approach starts with a thorough assessment of both your IT and OT environments, identifies the highest-risk gaps, and builds a practical roadmap that balances security improvement with operational continuity. We do not push solutions that will disrupt your production — we work with your operations team to implement controls that protect the business without getting in the way of it.
Whether you need a one-off cybersecurity assessment, ongoing managed security services, or help building your Essential Eight maturity, we are here to help.
Concerned about your manufacturing cybersecurity posture? Get in touch for a confidential conversation about your risks and how to address them.
