Security compliance in Japan

The Japan Information-technology Promotion Agency (IPA) entered into a formal collaboration agreement with the ISA Security Compliance Institute (ISCI) to facilitate adoption of the ISASecure™ industrial automation controls (IAC) certification program as a component of Japan’s initiative to secure critical infrastructure.

As part of the agreement, the IPA is translating the published ISASecure certification program specification into Japanese and will maintain future updates to the Japanese language ISASecure specification. The translated ISASecure specification will be posted to a Japanese language section of the SCI website for use by stakeholders in the Japanese IAC cyber security community. Adoption of the ISASecure certification scheme by Japan IPA expands the ISCI stakeholder community from suppliers and asset owners to government entities.

The ISASecure Embedded Device Security Assurance (EDSA) certification is the first ISCI security certification to be translated as part of the collaboration agreement between IPA and ISCI. Additional ISASecure certifications developed by ISCI will be translated by the IPA when they become available.

The IPA joined ISCI as a Government member in July 2012 to participate in the specification development of future ISASecure certification offerings including the System Security Assurance (SSA) certification planned for launch at the end of 2012. The SSA certification expands the scope of ISASecure certifications beyond embedded devices and will include entire control systems such as DCS and SCADA systems.

“We welcome the support and input from IPA and their team of distinguished IAC cyber security professionals,” said Andre Ristaino, managing director of ISCI “and look forward to supporting IPA’s initiatives for securing Japan’s critical infrastructure.”

To provide local support for ISASecure certification activity, the IPA is facilitating the establishment of ISO/IEC accredited ISASecure certification testing facilities in Japan.

“With ISCI, we are going to accelerate our global certification and make a contribution to the establishment and improvement of the secure society as well as of secure Japan,” said Kobayashi Hideaki, laboratory director of IPA security center.

ISASecure certification specifications are based on international standards such as ISO/IEC 15408, ISO/IEC 2700x, ISA99 / IEC 62443 and industry accepted cyber security practices for IAC systems development and integration methodologies with the intent to establish a single, globally recognized certification.