'CriticalXI’ a new critical infrastructure service offering aimed at Australia’s airports & seaports

SYDNEY, 2nd May 2024: This week sees the launch of CriticalXI, a new service modality aimed at addressing the challenges of impending legislation changes to the critical infrastructure and privacy acts faced by maritime and aviation ports (these fall under 'critical infrastructure').

Set up as a partnership between Orbus Software and Your Virtual CISO (YVC), the new offering aims to enable CIOs, CISOs, and enterprise architects at airports and seaports to visualise their IT systems so that they know what they have, where it resides, and the sensitivity of the data it contains. This ensures they can apply the appropriate risk management controls in their organisations and systems, especially with regard to upcoming changes to critical infrastructure legislation, including the SOCI ACT and the strengthening of the Privacy Act.

"Both seaports and airports face specific challenges in this area and require a tailored solution", said Matthew Neale, CEO of YVC. "The government is actively looking to make changes and widen the scope of critical infrastructure legislation - it's very much up in the air right now.

"Airports and seaports, specifically, are now under pressure to get their systems in order so they are ready for when the amendments come in."

"Airports, seaports and power infrastructure will likely be mandated to adopt a risk management framework similar to the GDPR in the UK and Europe for data privacy controls, as well as to manage cyber risks; this would include effective data governance," said Peter White, MD of APAC at Orbus Software.

"This creates a second challenge for airports and seaports - managing their IT portfolios. These organisations must know which systems talk to each other,  understand their operating environment, and have full visibility across the systems supporting the organisation. This is what our new offering, CriticalXI, does," Peter added.

CriticalXI's name is a reference to the 11 sectors under the Critical Infrastructure Act and is, in essence, a tool set of business capability planning, application portfolio management, and technology portfolio management, tailored into a product for use by airports and seaports, that is built on the OrbusInfinity platform. By implementing CriticalXI, users can respond now to inevitable legislative changes, support risk management, and offer effective IT governance.

With airports and seaports being both critical infrastructure assets and service providers to the community, running into problems could have catastrophic consequences. "This is compounded by the fact they are often quite lean resource-wise. CriticalXI addresses this gap in the market with a tailored solution that is hard to find anywhere else. We have already had fantastic feedback from customers," Mr White adds. "Believe it or not, there are some airports out there that are still managing their IT portfolio via spreadsheets, so there is clearly a need for our new offering."

Operational technology has typically been siloed from the IT department or managed through facilities. With rising geopolitical pressures fuelling the need to implement cybersecurity programs, operational technology (OT) managed outside of IT departments is being brought into the fold. OT requires specialist cybersecurity resources that understand frameworks such as IEC62443 or NIST SP 800-82, to tailor standards for securing OT systems, and organisations are looking to consolidate their systems governance for IT and OT under one umbrella.

"Adoption can be quicker among the nimble, smaller ports, with the larger ports often being slower to change due to their size, internal systems, and organisational complexity," adds Matthew Neale of YVC.

"We believe that CriticalXI may become the industry standard in how we address IT portfolio management to support the implementation of recognised global and domestic risk management frameworks such as ISO27001, NIST CSF, PSPF, AESCSF, and Essential 8."

-ENDS-

About Orbus

Orbus Software is a leading provider of cloud solutions for enterprise transformation, head-quartered in London and with regional offices in Sydney, Singapore, New York, and Dubai. Its enterprise platform provides a comprehensive view of applications, systems and data, allowing leaders to make informed decisions, optimise cost, minimise risks, and maintain operational resilience in the face of constant threats of disruption. Customers are predominantly global blue-chip enterprises and government organisations, including AstraZeneca, CIMB Bank, Investec, Three, and Saab. To learn more, follow Orbus Software on LinkedIn.   

For more information on this story, or the opportunity to interview someone from Orbus, please contact Dan Stewart on dan@brightus.com.au +61450008034