Over the past five years, cyberattacks targeting operational technology (OT) in manufacturing environments have grown in both frequency and sophistication. From ransomware crippling production lines to nation-state threats exploiting outdated firmware, the industrial sector has become a prime target. Amid this escalating threat landscape, one critical—yet often overlooked—pillar of cyber resilience is a robust backup strategy for OT systems, particularly programmable logic controllers (PLCs) and other field-level devices.

This session will explore the fundamental role of backups in OT environments: ensuring business continuity, reducing downtime, and accelerating recovery from both cyber and operational incidents. We will examine the unique challenges of implementing backup solutions in OT, such as limited device access, lack of standardization, and the need to minimize disruption to real-time operations.

One of the core challenges in implementing backup solutions for OT environments is the extreme heterogeneity of the ecosystem: a typical manufacturing facility runs equipment from multiple OT vendors, each requiring a different method to perform a backup with no interoperability between them. Even within a single vendor’s portfolio, backup procedures often vary significantly between device families or firmware versions, making standardization and automation exceedingly difficult.

The presentation will provide a survey of current industry practices, spanning:
• On-premises solutions, including manual approaches (e.g., technician-led exports or USB-based copies) and software-driven tools managed within the factory network.
• Hybrid models: combining on-site control with off-site storage or orchestration.
• Cloud-based strategies: from custom-built “roll your own” architectures to fully managed SaaS platforms designed for industrial backup and recovery.

Attendees will gain insights into the state of the art in OT backup strategies and practical guidance for enhancing their cyber resilience posture across legacy and modernized infrastructures.