“We were at a DEFCON security convention, which is a hacker’s convention, two or three years ago and they actually had a whiskey distillery set up that they hacked in front of everybody,” Hogue said. “They caused a massive explosion through remote access. For me, my big concern is security from an IT perspective. I don’t want somebody just plugging in a machine to the network that has potential hazardous impact. We’re a class 1 div 2 (explosive) environment; if somebody hacks into a machine, they could potentially cause massive damage to us.”
Hogue made his comments during a talk at Cisco Live last week in Orlando. The talk was reported by FierceTelecom.
He also said Beam Suntory mans a fleet of drones that fly over its growing fields. It’s looking not only at how the plants are growing but to monitor security. “Those drones have talk-back to cameras.
Beam Suntory also uses its Cisco IoT tools to manage its production processes and is looking at automation to help with traffic, mapping its trucks and rolling out new business offices. The goal: To be as completely automated much as possible.