From water treatment to electric generation, utilities are a critical part of U.S. critical national infrastructure (CNI). The public’s dependency on these services make them an increasingly attractive target for threat actors. Recent advisories from CISA detail ongoing campaigns against operational technology (OT) and industrial control systems (ICS), including direct compromises of Programmable Logic Controllers (PLCs) at U.S. water facilities. In many cases, incidents like these arise from basic weaknesses, such as default passwords and internet-exposed devices.
Public utilities organizations know they can’t afford a “We’ll check that in the morning” mentality. In this blog post, we’ll explore how public utilities can achieve 24x7x365 endpoint protection and monitoring using a different approach.
The Current Threat Landscape: Targeted, Persistent, and Faster
Cyber attacks targeting operational technology (OT) and ICS environments have intensified, with ransomware activity across industrial sectors continuing to accelerate specifically. Dragos recorded 742 ransomware incidents affecting industrial entities in Q3 2025 alone, an increase from earlier quarters, with notable growth in attacks impacting the energy and renewables sector.
Analysis of broader CNI trends show that industries such as manufacturing, healthcare, and energy are seeing steep year‑over‑year increases in ransomware targeting, with U.S. organizations among the most frequently hit. These patterns reinforce a clear reality: utilities sit squarely in the crosshairs of sophisticated and opportunistic threat actors.
Improving Defense with Earlier Threat Detection
The operational impacts of compromises in IT/OT spaces are immediate and consequential. Past events like the Colonial Pipeline ransomware attack demonstrate how a single IT compromise can trigger widespread operational shutdowns and costly recovery efforts.
A key finding from the recent SANS’ State of ICS/OT Security indicates that incidents were often detected within 24 hours and contained within 48 hours, demonstrating improvement in these areas. But there’s still work to be done to to detect potential incidents involving OT and ICS environments as early as possible.
The Case for 24x7x365 Monitoring and Response
Continuous coverage is essential to proactively assess, rapidly detect, and have 24x7x365 incident reporting to contain threats before they affect public services.
CIS Managed Detection and Response™ (CIS MDR™) is a fully managed, endpoint‑level protection and response service backed by the 24x7x365 Center for Internet Security® (CIS®) Security Operations Center (SOC) and available to U.S. State, Local, Tribal, and Territorial (SLTT) organizations, which include many public utilities.
To help mitigate these risks, CIS MDR supports your monitoring efforts with benefits such as:
1) Always‑on Monitoring
- Nonstop CIS SOC Coverage. The CIS SOC continuously monitors endpoints, analyzes activity (including zero‑day exploits/behavior‑based signals), and escalates actionable events — even when your internal teams are off duty.
- Analysis and Threat Containment. Our CIS SOC conducts further analysis of events and has the ability to contain the impacted host with permission from our affected partner.
- In some cases, and where prior permission for containment has been granted from our partner, the CIS SOC is able to execute containment even when the partner can’t be reached.
2) Expert Triage, Active Threat Response, and Clear Remediation Guidance
- Analyst‑Led Triage and Response. CIS SOC analysts investigate suspicious activity in real time and can take containment actions at the endpoint.
- Remediation Direction You Can Act On. CIS MDR escalates actionable guidance to your organization, and, in the event of a breach, CIS’s Cyber Incident Response Team (CIRT) assists with root‑cause and scope analysis using endpoint telemetry.
3) Reducing the Burden on Overstretched IT Teams
- Alert Fatigue Relief. CIS MDR filters out noise so your staff sees only meaningful alerts, reducing manual investigation load.
- A Force Multiplier for Small Teams. With CIS SOC acting as an extension of your team, you gain depth without building a larger team.
4) Cost‑Effective, Predictable Service Model
- Budget‑Friendly. CIS MDR’s subscription-style pricing is a cost‑effective endpoint protection and response solution, especially for public utilities operating under tight margins.
Visibility Where Utilities Need It Most: Plants, Offices, and the Field
CIS MDR deploys directly on endpoints (workstations, servers, and, with CIS MDR Mobile, mobile devices), giving utility leaders visibility across plant control‑room systems, administrative endpoints, and remote/field assets connected to various networks. As a result, this device‑level approach helps catch malicious activity regardless of where an endpoint is operating
Want to learn more about defending against cyber threats with CIS MDR? Check out our video below.
Make Endpoint Security Match the Tempo of Your Operations
Utilities deliver essential services every hour of every day. Threat actors operate at the same pace. MDR with CIS provides a trusted partner and force multiplier to assist public utilities partners with around‑the‑clock coverage monitoring and response that are needed to keep services going.
Ready to adopt continuous endpoint protection and response?
