ISA Insights

January 2008

The ISA Security Compliance Institute

During a formal planning teleconference last month, Founding Members of the ISA Security Compliance Institute announced the immediate opening of all membership levels in the ISASecure program for industrial automation controls security standards compliance.

Security is of paramount importance to every organization. Asset owners need assurance that the products they’re using adhere to a set of globally accepted standards. Technology providers need to differentiate their products from the rest of the field and give their users the peace of mind that they deserve.

During 2007, the ISA Security Compliance Institute has been accepting new memberships from asset owners and technology providers to join the automation controls industry program called ISASecure. The Institute's mission is to conduct independent assessments and validation of compliance to consensus industry security standards for manufacturing automation controls.

"The Founding Members elected to open all membership levels immediately to encourage full participation from the automation controls community," stated Andre Ristaino, Managing Director of ASCI. "We are looking forward to the contributions of talented security experts from key technology providers and asset owners who have made commitments at the Technical Membership level."

Membership levels in the ISA Security Compliance Institute include Strategic Members, Technical Members, and Informational Members. In addition, Founding Strategic Members are Strategic Members who have committed to two years of membership and funding to ensure the successful launch of the ISASecure program.

The ISA Security Compliance Institute is an industry consortium that facilitates an efficient forum of asset owners and suppliers for proposing, reviewing, and approving security conformance requirements for products in the automation controls industry. The resulting requirements form the basis for the ISASecure compliance designation, enabling suppliers to develop secure automation control products based on industry consensus security standards.

The ISASecure designation creates instant recognition of automation control products and systems that comply with ISASecure technical specifications. As a result, asset owners are able to efficiently procure and deploy ISASecure products with well known security characteristics that are in conformance with industry consensus security standards.

The ISASecure program is an extension of ISA sponsored services to the automation controls community, providing linkages between automation control security standards (such as ISA99) and compliance to those standards.

Read the ISA Security Compliance institute prospectus to learn more about the ISASecure program. Detailed descriptions of membership levels, entitlements, membership fee structure, and joining instructions are available on the ISASecure website at www.isa.org/ISASecure.

The Institute's Founding Members are meeting in 2008 to address governance and other key topics at the SANS Conference, 12-16 January in New Orleans, LA.

Please contact Andre Ristaino at (919) 990-9222 for more information.