Cybersecurity Risks of Portable Storage Media in OT Environments

The NIST National Cybersecurity Center of Excellence has developed the draft NIST Special Publication (SP) 1334, Reducing the Cybersecurity Risks of Portable Storage Media in OT Environments. The cybersecurity considerations in this two-pager are intended to help operational technology (OT) operators and manufacturers use Universal Serial Bus (USB) devices securely.

Portable storage media can be used to transfer data physically to and from OT environments. USB storage devices are convenient, but their use poses potential cybersecurity risks for organizations that utilize them in their OT environments. Organizations can reduce these risks with secure physical and logical controls on the access, storage, and usage of USB devices.

The NCCoE created an OT Security Series to provide simplified guidance that will assist organizations in securing their OT systems. If you have any comments about this paper, and/or recommendations for additional topics that the OT Security Series could cover, please reach out to the NCCoE Manufacturing team via [email protected].

The comment period for this paper closes on August 14, 2025.