How PSG Global Bridged the Gap from Military Infrastructure Security to the Commercial Market
Company overview
Prometheus Security Group Global (PSG) is an Austin, Texas-based integrated security technology firm specializing in cost-effective, zero-trust security solutions that protect strategic assets and critical infrastructure for government and commercial customers worldwide.
Industry: Security and Investigations
Project: Critical Infrastructure Protection
Country: USA
Project vision
When Jeremy Freeze-Skret, Vice President of Engineering at Prometheus Security Group Global (PSG), first approached Cedalo, he explained that their ‘Critical Infrastructure Protection’ solution included a suite of products geared towards infrastructure security.
“These are high-consequence, high-value assets like secure facilities, munitions, and aircrafts – and the protection levels and security requirements for the systems that protect these assets are very stringent.”
Jeremy Freeze-Skret
To ensure these demands were met, the PSG team needed a robust communication protocol engineered with redundancy and reliability.
After selecting MQTT as the core communication protocol, several of the top brokers on the market were considered during PSG’s evaluation process. Their team performed a comprehensive review that covered product-related aspects such as broker performance, security, and efficiency on one side and documentation, support, and pricing on the other. Additionally, they implemented a trial version of Pro Mosquitto and ran rigorous testing, which “showed Pro Mosquitto to be more compact and more efficient in terms of data transmissions,” according to Jeremy.
Along with the performance of the MQTT broker, the PSG team had to consider their customers’ extended sales cycles and deployment periods, which could last 10 to 20 years. So, they were searching for a reliable partner to support them for the long run. Mosquitto met this requirement as it has a proven track record with millions of global deployments since its initial release in 2015.
Moreover, Jeremy elaborated, “It was far easier to work with your team. You were very responsive and listened to our requirements – I felt I was heard. Unlike other vendors we spoke to, who wanted us to follow their standard approach, Cedalo was open to understanding and accommodating the customer’s needs.”
Based on the PSG team’s evaluation criteria, Pro Mosquitto emerged as the most suitable partner and is now a central component of their system architecture.
Solution
Prometheus primarily uses Pro Mosquitto to transport data for mission-critical security applications.
PSG’s system collects data from various sensors and access control devices and then transmits that data to monitoring and security monitoring terminals site-wide. The High Availability version is deployed at this layer to achieve redundancy in the critical communications service. These nodes are geographically separated from one another so that there is no single point of failure in the system.
Another level up to the Enterprise (Cloud/ Hybrid Cloud) Layer is where the information can be pumped into regional operations centers and Physical Security Information Systems (PSIMs).
HA and single-node Pro Mosquitto implementation
The PSG team implemented a combination of multiple single-node Pro Mosquitto MQTT brokers and a three-node High Availability (HA) cluster in their system.
The single-node brokers are deployed in relatively small, self-contained sites, but when these are scaled up across the enterprise, they aggregate into a larger system. At these high data volumes, reliability and redundancy became critical factors and required an HA cluster to fit the architecture.
“What was very attractive about Pro Mosquito was the concept of appropriately sizing subscriptions depending on different factors such as data volume, number of connected MQTT clients, etc. As a result, Cedalo’s flexibility allows us to scale the solution to fit the applications.”
Jeremy Freeze-Skret
Results
PSG is a longstanding, reliable partner and technical leader for clients such as the US Department of Defense and the US Department of Energy. They have extensive expertise in navigating the complexities of this specialized market, particularly in rigorous product certification testing and acceptance processes.
Utilizing Mosquitto has resulted in remarkable achievements for PSG. The outcome is a highly secure and scalable solution ranging from high-availability fault-tolerant clusters in large campus-wide data centers, processing thousands of messages per second, to more granular node-level processing. This allows PSG to tailor solutions precisely for each end user, fostering the growth of their security investment over time.
Moreover, PSG’s partnership with Cedalo and the engineering efforts of their R&D team have culminated in a product they can introduce to the commercial market.
“The Pro Mosquitto broker is an essential component enabling our open architecture, zero-trust solutions to seamlessly integrate with other vendor solutions. This opens opportunities across broader vertical markets dependent on SCADA, IIoT, and Operational Technology (OT) systems such as fire protection, safety, building automation, and industrial control systems.”
Steven Brown, Vice President of Business Development at PSG