Considerations for the Use of Wireless LANs in Plant Environments

Wireless LANs (WLANs) offer compelling operational advantages, yet have a well-deserved reputation as potential security risks. While numerous improvements have been made to the security and manageability of WLANs in recent years, many of these are overly complex, or introduce dependencies on outside infrastructure that may not be desirable in a Process Control/SCADA system environment. This document presents the considerations that should go into the design of a secure WLAN solution for Process Control/SCADA, and how to appropriately identify and mitigate security risks.