Patent ID: 7950044

Claim:
A system that facilitates enhanced security with respect to an industrial automation environment, comprising: a central access authority embodied on a computer-readable storage medium and executed by one or more processors, the central access authority configured to provide access rules relating to a device; and a proxy associated with the device configured to receive the access rules from the central access authority if it is determined that the device is not capable of storing the access rules internally, wherein the proxy is configured to directly receive an access request directed to the device and to determine whether the access request is permitted based at least in part upon characteristics of the access request and the access rules, wherein the proxy is further configured to issue a query to the device and to create a fingerprint of the device based on the query, the fingerprint logically linking the proxy to the device, and wherein the proxy is further configured to detect replacement of the device with a replacement device and to employ the fingerprint to confirm that the replacement device is a valid replacement.