EuroWire September 2017

Transatlantic cable

are now accessible by way of corporate networks and the Internet. The Trend Micro authors readily found many examples of Internet-connected industrial robots. “We were looking for connected robots from the top vendors . . . and found several, some of which even provided unrestricted access using anonymous credentials.” Ie, the authentication system was disabled. (From “Rogue Robots: Testing the Limits of an Industrial Robot’s Security”) Of related interest . . . † The results of a recent BT survey of 1,501 information technology (IT) decision makers across UK organisations of all sizes revealed that arti cial intelligence (AI) technologies are already being implemented by over one-third of respondents. Also as reported by BT Newsroom (12 th June), one in four organisations told the communications services provider that it used such automation technologies as robots, drones or autonomous vehicles, with almost two-thirds describing the adoption as “very bene cial.” Even as decision makers in the UK are divided about the impact of “disruptive” technologies – the so-called Fourth Industrial Revolution – on the labour market, one-third of the surveyed organisations planning to implement AI over the next two years expect it to mean more jobs, not fewer. This re ects the view that AI will generate new opportunities for programmers, algorithm designers and software engineers and create new job categories for AI-centred trainers, ethicists and lawyers.

However, the main thrust of the Trend Micro report was not worker safety but industrial sabotage: real damage done to industrial machinery by compromised software. It considers imperceptible changes that could be introduced by way of industrial robots, leading to subtle defects in the goods being produced. Any such threat would leave manufacturers vulnerable to blackmail, much like the victims of the WannaCry ransomware exploit which in May of this year infected computers worldwide. † Some ways in which users of co-bots fail to protect themselves were duly noted. Much of the software running these industry-grade devices is not properly updated and patched to correct known software vulnerabilities. Users may not be diligent about their default authentication credentials. And straightforward hacker-proo ng measures like code-signing for rmware upgrades are often neglected. Worrisome as these are, such lapses can be recti ed. What came as much more of a surprise to Mr Schneider, who assumed that great pains would always be taken to keep industrial robots isolated, was the extent to which they are connected to the Internet. He wrote: “When I dabbled in CNC [computer numerical control] work in my garage several years ago, I was careful to keep my router-toting robot o the Internet for the sake of safety. But apparently that’s not the case in industry these days.” † To ignore the implicit warning here would be folly. Industrial robots – conceived to be isolated – have evolved and

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September 2017