Schneider Electric, the leader in the digital transformation of energy management and automation, has today announced the integration of WALLIX Inside into its line of Harmony P6 industrial PCs. WALLIX and Schneider Electric’s partnership spans more than 5 years, and together the companies will be further cementing this by launching an integrated solution that ensures the enhanced security of connections for the systems of industrial plants, commercial buildings, hospitals, and data centers.

WALLIX Inside allows industrial engineering specialists to manage identity and access between their solution and connected industrial machines to secure access to data in transit. Through the partnership, Schneider Electric, has integrated WALLIX’s “by design” technologies directly into its new line of industrial PCs called Harmony P6. This i-PAM (Industrial Privileged Access Management) device is a plug & play secure connectivity solution for industrial PLC programming and maintenance operations.

WALLIX Inside secures connection sessions on the Schneider Electric software tools that address production lines, especially the EcoStruxure^TM Expert Control application for PLC programming.

Therefore, the connection of the operator to the PLCs will automatically go through WALLIX Inside, which provides authentication and verification of session rights. Depending on the information received, WALLIX Inside will be able to make the connection to the PLC itself with a non-accessible password that will be changed after use.

Industrial companies can now:

• Protect their system by being the sole administrators and by controlling all connections, whether they are made onsite or remotely via a VPN
• As administrators, give the necessary rights to a session so they can troubleshot remotely
• Ensure the operator’s identity
• Follow the orders sent to the PLC in real or delayed time.

 

WALLIX Inside is also applicable on a heterogeneous industrial park of several sites, with many different brands and PLC versions.

Frédéric Petit, Marketing Manager for Industrial Automation Solutions and Services at Schneider Electric, says: “We are going further in our partnership with WALLIX, with whom we developed the i-PAM offer in 2017, by integrating WALLIX Inside technologies into our industrial solutions on an ad hoc basis and as part of a great project. Today, we have taken up the challenge of integrating it directly into this new, high added value Harmony P6 offer, the production of which has just been launched.”

Kristine Kirchner, VP Channel EMEA at WALLIX, states: “Our collaboration with Schneider Electric reflects our desire to speed up the current level of cybersecurity for industrial facilities and the path to Industry 4.0. The upsurge in cyber-attacks shows that companies using industrial systems face a real challenge in securing their access and connections, especially in terms of remote access. The collaboration between WALLIX and Schneider Electric is an example of the need to integrate cybersecurity technologies into industrial equipment, which is essential to Industry 4.0 in an increasingly digital world. ”

Yann Bourjault, Digital Transformation & Cybersecurity Manager at Schneider Electric, adds: “We are pleased to reinforce our 5-year relationship with WALLIX, which is the leader of the privileged access in Europe and has enabled us to achieve this common value proposition, based on our two complementary expertises. Our Network Engineering & Cybersecurity (NEC) team works on our digital transformation offers to make them as secure as possible and thus raise the security standards of French manufacturers. ”