Zero Trust As Pharma 4.0 Strategy

Optimize IT/OT Security Without Overhauling Your Current Digital Infrastructure

In today's life science manufacturing processes, information technology (IT), more traditional operational technology (OT), and the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) are merged in an intricate and sophisticated manner.

As a result of this technological convergence, businesses frequently need to reassess multiple aspects of their operations, including physical and logical security.

Ensuring security in a Pharma 4.0 context can be more difficult than in other industries.

However, it is business-critical for long-term success.

One of the reasons why safeguarding smart factories is more difficult is the technical limits of manufacturing devices and machines, which present several security issues. These technologies cannot execute more advanced security functions such as encryption or authentication because, while these operations may appear simple, they need a significant amount of processing power, which these devices lack.

An apparent but maybe impractical solution to this problem is to employ technologies that are not limited by technical constraints that interfere with the security process and have more computer capacity to conduct advanced security activities.

Using firewalls, VPNs, and cloud SASE to protect devices and machines is also an option. However, these traditional and perimeter-based security approaches are limited in terms of security, scalability, and performance.

Implementing Zero Trust security offers a more workable and realistic answer to this problem.

Zero Trust, as defined by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), is a set of emerging cyber security paradigms that shift defenses away from static, network-based perimeters and toward a focus on users, assets, and resources. Zero Trust presupposes that no implicit trust is given to resources or user accounts based just on their geographic or network location.

In pharmaceutical manufacturing, smart factories can take advantage of the Zero Trust security and Privacy by Design architecture of the Nymi Connected Worker solution, which is delivered through a platform and wearable.

The Nymi Band is recognized as an innovative wearable purpose-built for pharmaceutical environments. In conjunction with the Nymi Connected Worker Platform, it acts as a unifying layer to connect people once-and-to-all their workplace technologies with best-practice security features; such as, biometric, continuous and multi-factor authentication.

Essentially, by applying a Zero Trust framework to identity, organizations who deploy Nymi can navigate complex network and access convergence with the connected worker.

Our connected worker approach makes implementing Zero Trust architecture practical for today's mobile workforce by blending passwordless, multifactor, and continuous authentication into a straightforward wearable design that is both delightful for operators and secure for organzations.

With a connected worker approach, Nymi also enables innovation of facilities with little to no downtime and no upheaval to the current IT infrastructure.

Rather than tearing down and replacing existing technological infrastructure, Nymi can be used to create a new security layer. Nymi connects to current infrastructure through a vast partner ecosystem and standards-based approach, which strengthens the security and privacy layer that surrounds your company's technologies and the employees who use them.

Plus, we make deployment a true partnership. We provide our expertise at all stages; during site surveys, pilots, and validation. We work with 9 of the top 10 global pharmaceutical manufacturers spanning 15 countries.

Finally, Nymi provides a strategic solution that delivers other benefits beyond those of traditional security measures, such as improved employee experience, user privacy, data integrity, compliance, credentialing management, efficiency, agility, and scalability.

Conclusion

The challenges of ensuring safety in a Pharma 4.0 environment is greater than in other sectors. While other solutions require extensive downtime and disruptive changes to the existing IT infrastructure, the Zero Trust security and Privacy by Design architecture in Nymi's connected worker solution makes it possible to modernize your facilities and workforce with minimal disruption and maximal strategic value.