US-based vendor Celona launched an integrated zero-trust framework enabling enterprises to securely use the same private 5G infrastructure across their digitised industrial IT and OT systems, addressing what founder and CEO Rajeev Shah (pictured) sees as a key problem with the networks.

Shah told Mobile World Live (MWL) the Aerloc security portfolio integrates zero-trust principles with Celona’s enterprise 5G LAN architecture to allow enterprises to run IT and OT on the same network while keeping them separate.

He noted private 5G networks can address reliability concerns associated with Wi-Fi, but “there is a whole series of security challenges”.

Aerloc uses private SIM-based authentication in conjunction with unified zero trust environments for IT and OT devices.

By overlaying SIM-based authentication, it can identify and distinguish multiple types of devices, sensors and machines while maintaining their policies.

Open APIs provide integration across firewalls, network access control (NAC) systems and SD-WAN offerings, and the set-up works with cloud, on site or a combination of the two.

It works with products from security companies including Palo Alto Networks and Zscaler.

IT and OT traffic is separated by an air gap using slicing technology, with physical and logical segmentation OTA and on LAN.

Shah said separating OT and IT traffic allows enterprises to maintain security and performance across both environments.

“You now have IT and OT running on the same potential 5G network, but we have maintained the physical air gap down to physical resources on the spectrum all the way to the ethernet LAN.”

“That’s a huge deal for these customers, because they really don’t want any contamination of IT and OT.”

A third element of Aerloc is dynamic and distributed policy enforcement, which is combined with posture assessment tools, IoT security technologies and security orchestration automation platforms.

Celona states the approach delivers a collaborative security architecture for local and responsive security enforcement from individual devices to the edge of a network, reducing potential attack surfaces.

Roy Chua, founder and principal of research company AvidThink, told MWL the current cybersecurity landscape means “enterprises and governments alike are concerned about securing IT and OT infrastructure, and the zero-trust framework has seen stronger adoption”.

Channel programme
The vendor also announced its new Celona Frequency Channel Partner Programme, providing training and marketing resources along with global distribution through IT multinational TD SYNNEX.

“We want to create this community because we believe that’s an opportunity for them to exchange ideas, because right now the market’s really picking up steam,” Shah said.

Chua said AvidThink believes a key driver of private wireless will be “go-to-market motions that mirror that of enterprise Wi-Fi”.

“Most of that are partner and channel-led, which requires an understanding of repeatable deployments without taking up too much vendor specialist resources.”