OT Security training goals and priorities for 2026

Its time to get our 2026 security plan in place. This is why we are publishing a series of articles designed to help with your OT security priorities for the year 2026. Today we take a detailed look at your training goals for 2026.

As the convergence of IT and OT accelerates, and the threat landscape shifts toward AI-enabled attacks and devastating supply chain disruption, Operational Technology (OT) security training also needs to undergo a remarkable transformation. It needs to evolve from being a checklist-based compliance exercise to a core and lasting component of operational resilience. The goal should be to create a security culture where every employee is an informed proactive defender and not a vulnerable target.

Before we move forward, don’t forget to check out our previous post on “Setting up an IEC 62443-aligned ICS security test bed” here.

At the frontlines: the pivotal role of employees

The simple yet most effective control in any industrial environment is a vigilant, informed, trained employee. In the world of OT, a simple click on a phishing link or the improper use of a USB drive or even a misconfigured device can lead to or escalate from a network breach to a physical safety incident, making employees the pivotal role in ensuring secure operations.

Training focus: Moving from generic security awareness to actionable cyber-physical risk awareness.

Social engineering: Training must simulate highly advanced, hyper-realistic AI-enabled social engineering attempts (vishing and phishing) that target specific industrial roles (such as a "fake" call from the plant manager authorizing a remote connection or an OEM support team asking the employee to deploy an unauthorized patch).
Physical media: Strict, continuous training on the safe handling, scanning, and logging of all removable media before connecting it to an OT network.
Secure remote access: Enforcing Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) and Least Privilege principles, and training staff to recognize and report when credentials are being misused or abused.
Incident response: What to do when a breach or an anomaly is detected? Employee should know what to report, how to report and the actions that need to be taken as well.
Chain of information: Employees should know how to pass on knowledge across the organisation to ensure that everyone is covered in terms of an actions to be taken to ensure security
Know your data: Employees should be able to figure out if their data has been leaked and is now being sold or transferred illegally on the Dark web or other forums.
Employees should be aware of the threat environment that surrounds their operations. This is necessary to ensure they adopt adequate precautions and diligence while at work
All employees should contribute to OT risk audits

Blind spots to visibility: Addressing the lack of asset visibility

The lack of comprehensive OT asset visibility remains a critical vulnerability. OT networks often contain a mix of legacy systems, unpatched controllers, and new IIoT devices that traditional IT scanners miss. Employees can be trained to ensure they call out such gaps.

Training goal: Empower operations and maintenance teams to become active contributors to the asset inventory.

System awareness: Train personnel to correctly identify the Purdue Model levels and Security Zones of the assets they interact with, understanding why isolating a Level 1 PLC from the enterprise network is critical.
Process Documentation: Establish procedures where maintenance logs must include firmware versions, patch status, and network connection details upon commissioning or repair. This turns daily work into a continuous inventory update process.
There must be a formal process in place to transfer asset knowledge across operations, maintenance, employee retirement etc.

Proactive defense: Challenges with emerging threats

The threats for 2026 are shifting from simple malware to sophisticated, multi-layered extortion and disruption campaigns that target the convergence layer.

AI-Enabled Attacks: Attackers will use AI to automate reconnaissance and craft highly customized phishing and vulnerability exploits.
Supply Chain Attacks: Training must include identifying and reporting suspicious activity from third-party vendors and service providers. This means strictly enforcing secure access protocols and auditing vendor activity.
ERP/OT Disruption: Recognizing that attacks may now pivot from compromising the business systems (ERP, scheduling) to cripple OT operations, staff need to understand the data paths between IT and OT systems.

Measuring readiness: Awareness and testing

The level of awareness needed is functional: employees must be able to perform their job securely without compromising safety or operations.

Awareness Level	Description	How to Test/Measure Readiness
Level 1: Foundational	Understands the OT risk profile (safety first, availability priority).	Annual Security Awareness Training (SAT) completion and compliance quizzes.
Level 2: Role-Specific	Can execute security policies directly related to their daily tasks.	Targeted phishing simulations (e.g., a "maintenance request" email).
Level 3: Operational	Can identify and respond correctly to a confirmed security event.	Scenario-based tabletop exercises (e.g., a malware outbreak at Level 3).
Level 4: Resilient	Can safely execute manual failovers and assist in forensic data preservation. Can manage events at various levels	Quarterly Incident Response Drills focusing on containment and recovery steps.

The governance backbone: IEC 62443 and training

The IEC 62443 series is the international standard for IACS security, and its significance for training is paramount because it provides a common language, a structured, risk-based approach, and specific requirements for a robust security management system.

The training goal: Embed the risk-based approach and defense-in-depth principles of IEC 62443 into all training curricula.

For leadership: Training must focus on defining the overall IACS Security Program and the required Security Levels (SL) for different zones, aligned with IEC 62443-2-1. Leadership should be risk-aware.
For engineering teams: Deep training on Zoning and Conduit implementation, risk assessment methodologies, and Secure Product Development Lifecycle practices.
For all roles (including vendors): Understanding that every policy right from password changes to patch management is a control required by the standard to achieve the defined Security Levels.

Minimizing impact: Incident response essentials

In OT, a cyber incident is a safety and operational crisis. Incident response essentials in 2026 must be focused on minimizing physical impact and ensuring rapid, safe recovery.

Knowing how to detect and classify an event: The first step is to know when an even is occurring and to classify it as per information available in order to accord adequate attention.
Safety-first containment: Training must mandate the immediate priority of human safety and equipment protection over data preservation or system uptime. Personnel must know the safe, manual failover and shutdown procedures instantly.
Clear command structure: Drills must clarify who has the authority to isolate a critical system or shut down production (the "red button" authority). This is often an OT Manager, not an IT security lead.
Cross-functional Practice: Mandate quarterly tabletop exercises that include OT operations, IT security, executive leadership, and communications teams, simulating the complex decisions needed during a crisis.
Forensics and recovery: Train OT staff on securing immutable, offline backups of industrial configurations and control logic, and non-invasive log collection to aid post-incident analysis.

Looking ahead at your training priorities for 2026

The industrial environment is the new frontier for cyber warfare and sophisticated criminal activity. By making role-specific, measured, and standards-driven training a non-negotiable component of operations, organizations will build a workforce that is not only competent and risk aware, but measurably resilient against the cyber-physical threats of tomorrow.

The OT security training priorities for 2026 will include:

Refreshing security basis
Understanding how various breaches occurred in 2025 and lessons to be imbibed from them
Risk accountability
Actionable awareness
Deploying IEC 62443-based controls and supervising them
Tracking the right KPIs
Understanding the implications of the evolving threat environment

2026 OT Security Training Checklist

Area	Goal	Checklist Item
Governance	Align training with risk-based standards.	IEC 62443-aligned training for management on SLs and Zoning.
Awareness	Counter advanced social engineering.	Quarterly phishing simulations targeting OT-specific scenarios.
Visibility	Turn staff into asset inventory contributors.	Training on asset discovery tools and proper logging of new/modified devices.
Response	Reduce incident impact and recovery time.	Mandatory quarterly IT/OT cross-functional tabletop exercises.
Technology	Secure access to critical systems.	100 percent adoption and training on MFA for all remote and privileged access.
Threats	Be threat-aware	Know what type of threats are lurking so as to operate with adequate level of risk sensitivity

Role-based training essentials for 2026

Here is a set of role-based training fundamentals recommended by Shieldworkz.

Role	Core OT security focus	Essential training topics
Control Room Operator	Immediate, safe physical response and procedure adherence.	Manual process control/override procedures; recognizing HMI anomalies; secure log-in/log-out.
Maintenance Technician	Physical security and secure connection practices.	Secure USB/removable media handling; vendor access control; secure firmware flashing procedures.
OT Network Engineer	Network segmentation and zero-trust implementation.	IEC 62443 Zoning and Conduit design; industrial protocol (Modbus, Profinet) security; firewall rule auditing.
IT Security Analyst	Bridging IT/OT monitoring and threat intelligence.	ICS-specific attack frameworks (MITRE ATT&CK for ICS); OT asset inventory and vulnerability scoring differences.
Management	Security leadership and enterprise risk control along with risk accountability	Tracking risk KPIs, signing off on risk exposure, evidence based auditing and leading with knowledge and awareness of risks