Nozomi debuts Guardian Air wireless spectrum sensor for enhanced OT and IoT security

January 25, 2024

Industrial cybersecurity company Nozomi Networks introduced Wednesday Guardian Air, a wireless spectrum sensor purpose-built for OT (operational technology) and IoT environments worldwide. Guardian Air can help reduce attack options by providing much-needed visibility into wireless-enabled devices, which until now could only be detected once connected to the wired network.

Guardian Air enables immediate visibility into wirelessly connected assets, continuously monitoring wireless frequencies for potential threats, detecting threats, and triangulating locations for faster remediation. It also provides much-needed visibility into wirelessly enabled devices which until now were only detected once connected to the wired network. With the addition of Guardian Air, customers have a comprehensive network solution all in one integrated platform.

With Guardian Air, IT security professionals and OT operators can continuously monitor prominent wireless frequency technologies used in OT and IoT environments including Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, cellular, LoRaWAN, Zigbee, GPS, drone RF protocols, and WirelessHART. It also enables immediately detecting wirelessly connected assets and gaining asset information to quickly address unauthorized installations and detect wireless-specific threats, including brute force attacks, spoofing, and bluejacking – with the added ability to determine the location of the devices performing the attacks.

It also helps to seamlessly integrate wireless data into a single OT and IoT security platform that unifies asset visibility from the endpoint and across wired and wireless networks.

“Wireless is fundamentally changing the way industrial organizations operate. Unfortunately, it also massively expands the potential attack surface,” Andrea Carcano, co-founder and chief product officer at Nozomi Networks, said in a media statement. “Guardian Air solves this problem by giving customers the accurate visibility they need at the wireless level to minimize risk while maximizing resiliency. Because Guardian Air integrates easily into the Nozomi Networks Vantage platform, customers can combine network, endpoint, and wireless for the greatest visibility, threat detection, and AI-powered analysis for real-time security management and remediation across the entire attack surface.”

“Nozomi Networks has once again innovated to address an unmet need for wireless-level monitoring in OT and IoT environments,” said Danielle VanZandt, an industry manager for commercial and public security research at Frost & Sullivan. “From smart manufacturing to digital medicine, to building automation, to modern oil field production and more, today industrial organizations are relying on billions of wireless devices to speed production and time to market. Guardian Air gives IT security professionals and OT operators the visibility needed to get a firm handle on wireless risk management and response.”

While many OT security solutions only see wireless assets once they are connected to the wired network, the Guardian Air sensor continuously monitors prominent wireless frequencies. By operating in a wide variety of frequencies, Guardian Air provides real-time monitoring and detailed information on areas such as rogue installations or drones. Drones can be utilized to perform attacks and take pictures of critical facilities. or carry equipment for attacks or exfiltration of valuable information. With Guardian Air, operators can detect the presence of drones and the equipment attached to them, enabling security teams to take corrective action.

Nozomi identified that the nature of a wireless connection means that cyber adversaries don’t need to be close to exploit an asset’s vulnerabilities. Guardian Air provides ongoing threat detection of wireless-specific threats, including brute force attacks, spoofing, and bluejacking.

For example, Guardian Air can detect de-authentication attacks and triangulate the location of the devices performing the attacks. Alarms can be set to notify security teams enabling them to take immediate countermeasures – bolstering defenses and minimizing impacts to critical operations.

With the addition of the Guardian Air sensor, the Nozomi Networks platform provides a comprehensive network solution for OT and IoT environments. Guardian Air data is seamlessly integrated into Vantage, Nozomi Network’s cloud-based management system, along with wired network and endpoint data for unified visibility of connected assets. Security teams have visibility into all attack surfaces, threat detection, and vulnerability assessment in one robust, integrated platform.

The Nozomi wireless sensor will be available this spring from Nozomi Networks and its extensive global network of channel partners.

Last January, Nozomi announced the availability of Nozomi Arc sensors that extend visibility across endpoint attack surfaces and reduce time to resiliency through faster deployments. It supports vulnerability assessment, endpoint protection, traffic analysis capabilities, and more accurate diagnostics of in-progress threats and anomalies, including identifying compromised hosts with malware, rogue applications, unauthorized USB drives, and suspicious user activity.