As systems converge - Are resellers meeting the skills gap?

Hi,

This is an observation and thought that was triggered today by the headline from the Black Hat Conference  that SCADA systems are under the security microscope.

Over the past few years I have worked on large projects with resellers to install various converged systems, one example being IP telephony. An observation which I find echoed through the industry is this... Companies who started off as traditional suppliers of products such as telephony, CCTV, access control etc who have now moved into the IP world really struggle with the concepts of data networking and would appear that they haven't recruited or trained accordingly in this field. On the other hand it appears that those who have been trained in data networking find the switch to learning telephony for example far easier.
So the question is this... Are the security concerns with systems such as SCADA another example of where FM system providers have failed to recruit and train with the move towards convergence and as such these systems are installed with network security as an oversight?.

I would certainly suggest that companies investing heavily in such systems have the correct skills available to sense check any installation and challenge these resellers in security principles.

J