The critical communication industry is undergoing a transformation. The adoption of 4G and 5G technology in a variety of architectures is the object of investigation and discussion around cybersecurity among industry stakeholders: telco, device and application vendors, operators and agencies. A new white paper from TCCA aims to be the first milestone of a joint journey among all these stakeholders towards secure critical communication broadband networks and associated services.

New broadband mission-critical networks are articulated and feature rich entities, multiply interconnected with other systems using open standards that are well understood by threat actors but leverage on the long experience of the 3GPP ecosystem that has been securing such networks for decades. Mission-critical broadband communications will involve a much wider ecosystem of vendors than narrowband solutions. 

TCCA’s new white paper: ‘Cybersecurity in Critical Communications  - an initial overview’ provides broad information on international organisations driving cybersecurity requirements; cybersecurity frameworks and methodologies; network deployment models and more. Recommendations for organisations include  building internal cyber security teams at the start of solution design and before they engage with vendors, and to onboard additional cyber security personnel and teams that understand the new threats posed.

A critical broadband communication solution will include new types of assets that require protecting.  Organisations must understand all the assets that will form part of a complete solution, from Radio Access Network (RAN), network core, Mission Critical (MCX) provider, devices, Subscriber Identity Modules (SIM), applications, device management solutions, etc.  With this number of assets from varied vendors the supply chain is particularly vulnerable to attack.

“As critical broadband communications networks emerge globally, organisations should collaborate to share knowledge and experiences, with a longer-term vision of building international standards to enable an even more robust and secure set of mission critical communications solutions for everyone,” said Filippo Gaggioli from TCCA member Nokia, who leads the Cybersecurity task force within TCCA’s Critical Communications Broadband Group (CCBG).

“The cyber environment for mission critical broadband networks is significantly more complex and the amount of stakeholders is higher than in traditional narrowband networks,” said Tero Pesonen, CCBG chair. “I am delighted to see TCCA members addressing this with an educational overview. This is an important first milestone in a chain of cyber security related work that will take place in the community.”

The white paper ‘Cybersecurity in Critical Communications – an initial overview’ – can be found here.