Earlier this year, a well-established European industrial manufacturer suffered a catastrophic ransomware attack. Printers across the facility began spewing ransom notes. Production lines stopped. Orders went unfulfilled. Within weeks, the company — more than a century old — filed for insolvency.

The exact entry point of the attack remains unconfirmed. But in today’s threat landscape, email remains the most common initial attack vector in ransomware campaigns — especially in manufacturing environments where IT and OT are increasingly interconnected.

At Open Systems, we believe email security is a critical frontline defense for protecting your operations and avoiding this kind of worst-case scenario.

A Chain Reaction That Started Somewhere — and Spread Everywhere

The attack didn’t need to begin on the production floor. All it took was one breach — possibly an email, a remote access misconfiguration, or an exposed system — and the ransomware spread rapidly across business and operational systems.

The consequences were swift and severe:

• Business systems were paralyzed.
• Production lines were halted.
• Orders worth hundreds of thousands of euros went unfulfilled.
• Revenue losses in the millions followed.
• The company filed for insolvency within weeks.

This wasn’t a theoretical case. It was real. And it could happen to any manufacturer.

Why Manufacturers Are Prime Targets

Modern manufacturers operate at the intersection of IT and OT — and that intersection is increasingly vulnerable:

• Email-based attacks often exploit human trust and lack of awareness.
• Legacy systems on the production side may lack endpoint protection or patching mechanisms as well as visibility
• Operational downtime has immediate financial and reputational consequences.
• Operational staff may not be trained in cybersecurity best practices

In these environments, a single undetected threat — regardless of entry point — can cascade into a full-blown crisis.

Open Systems Email Security: Smart Protection for Modern Manufacturing

Open Systems provides a fully managed, intelligent Email Security solution that helps stop threats before they ever reach your users — closing off one of the most common and damaging entry points.

With Open Systems Email Security, you get:

• Advanced Multi-Layer Malware Detection
  Intercepts malicious files and attachments at multiple points, preventing them from reaching your environment.
• Phishing and Impersonation Protection
  Enforces SPF, DKIM, and DMARC protocols to block spoofed senders and domains, reducing the risk of identity-based attacks.
• Real-Time Sandboxing and Behavioral Analysis
  Detects, isolates, and analyzes suspicious content in real time to prevent advanced threats from executing.
• Seamless Integration with Zero Trust and SASE Architectures
  Natively integrates with Zero Trust and Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) frameworks to enforce strict access controls and threat containment—across both IT and OT environments.

And because it’s a fully managed service, your internal teams are supported 24×7 by global cybersecurity experts.

A Real-World Lesson: Don’t Wait for a Wake-Up Call

The incident referenced above underscores how devastating ransomware can be — not just to data, but to operations, orders, and reputations. Whether the attack enters through email or another route, securing every entry point is essential. And email remains the most common and most accessible.

Resilience Starts with the Inbox

Modern email is both a critical business tool and a major risk vector. In manufacturing, it connects suppliers, clients, logistics, and finance — but when abused by attackers, it can also connect them directly to your most sensitive systems.

Open Systems Email Security is designed to meet that challenge — with proactive, intelligent protection and a human-led defense that never sleeps.

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Final Thought

Email might seem far removed from your production floor — until it isn’t. Whether the threat starts with a phishing email or a misconfigured system, Open Systems helps you reduce risk at the edge and build real resilience across your entire environment.