ElevenPaths, Telefónica Cyber Security Unit, announces it intends to collaborate with Symantec, as a global cybersecurity leader,  on integrating Symantec Managed PKI Service in order to protect IoT environments against cyberattacks.

In the Internet of Things millions of different devices are interconnected in an open digital environment and need to communicate securely at all times in order to preserve the trustworthiness of the IoT applications. Identity and Authentication is a cornerstone of building such trust, therefore Telefonica is developing ways to securely and indisputably identify those devices and secure the data transmitted among them.

That is, as in the physical world our ID card or passport identify us as people, in the context of the IoT Telefónica is in the process of developing its Trusted  Public  Key  Infrastructure service, and will be relying on best- in-class Symantec Managed PKI Certificate Technology to ensure that the connected devices are exactly what they claim to be and that code running on IoT devices is authorized.

The high-volume, high-performance managed certificate service Symantec offers will allow Telefónica to embed certificates on hardware or issue them in real time as required for their specific use case. These code signing certificates and cloud based signing-as-a-service will be part of Telefonica’s comprehensive offer for IoT environment.

With the new technology incorporated by Telefónica companies that require large-scale IoT deployments will be able to manage certificates’ lifecycle for auto enrollment, renew and revoke the certificates to secure the communication and provide mutual identification, encrypt communications end-to-end and guarantee the integrity and traceability of the transactions.

Trusted Public Key infrastructure service is integrated with other security and IoT managed connecting as smart M2M and is part of IoT Security solutions currently  on  offer  by  Telefónica:  such  CyberThreats, capable  of detecting  and  identifying  the  modus  operandi  of  the  cybercriminals and  the  methods  used  in attacks against IoT infrastructure; and Faast IoT technology specialised in detecting and analyzing vulnerabilities in IoT ecosystems.

Telefónica and Symantec intend their future collaboration to deliver on 4 key cornerstones that are drivers for the IoT and its security: the protection of communications, securing the identity and authentication of the IoT devices, the protection of devices themselves, including host-based protection and reputation based security, the management of the devices including OTA management, and the understanding of the IoT environment, through security analytics helping flag any anomaly.