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Leased lines, MPLS, custom routing setups, hell just a VPN that fails closed. There are so many options for doing this, all more secure that just slapping a device online behind whatever router the cheapest ISP gave you.

The problem is that many of these setups are put behind essentially consumer connections, but with a better support contract or simply fitted with a 5G modem and a SIM card from the cell provider with the cheapest plan.

Building a WAN isn't magic, but it does require working with (competent) ISPs and paying the higher cost.

by SoftTalker7 hours ago|

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Remote control does not mean "has a public IP address."

Yes you might need to be able to centrally monitor and manage things but that should be happening on a private network.

by adrian_b6 hours ago|

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A public IP address may be a necessity, but with a properly configured VPN it is irrelevant whether anyone knows the public IP addresses.

by iugtmkbdfil8347 hours ago|

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Surely, there must be a way that does not force the devices onto world wide web..

by sgc7 hours ago|

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Seems like 95% of devices could be managed with a hardware filter that only allows through a handful of very rudimentary signals (more like Morse code than a full digital transmission), and then of course a properly designed on-device API that defines those signals and doesn't allow you to trigger a defrost remotely, when that should only ever be done with somebody physically present for example.

by lxgr6 hours ago|

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Morse code is a fully digital transmission.

How exactly would a more obscure (or even “analog”) encoding help? This seems orthogonal to reducing surface complexity and remotely executable command subsets.

by sgc2 hours ago|

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The point is having the digital transmission simple enough that you can use fully *physical* filters to discard everything but the 3-4 messages you need through. Of course it is still digital, but my point is, it is a physically enforced studied, safe subset and doesn't allow for full network access. There are of course a variety of ways to further firewall that, but something needs to act like as much of an air gap as possible while allowing for remote communications.

by lxgr2 hours ago|

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How do you authenticate such a system? 3-4 “quasi analog” messages seem incredibly easy to replay, if nothing else. If you need to depend on something actually cryptographic to make the system replay proof, you can just as well use that system for all aspects of access control. This makes no sense.

by iAMkenough7 hours ago|

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I'm interested to know how many "legacy" controllers no longer patched by the manufacturer are operating solar and wind farms today.

If it's a lot, maybe the manufacturers should be compelled to provide security patches if remote control is required to operate their products. For the sake of national security, of course.