And the wacky thing about bedrock kicks it up a few notches. they seem to be claiming to actually encrypt data OVER ITS OWN BACKPLANE, which is a new level of paranoid. That's on the same level as someone reading data off your monitor via the signals it emits. Hypothetically possible, but a super impractical exploit.
On a related note, I think encrypting IO data is a great idea. It's one of the best ways to secure the local network. It seems like it could be incorporated into EIP or PN, but the trick would be whether it should be implemented in hw, and therefore fast, or software, and therefore upgradable if/when exploits are discovered. Siemens has already introduced some kind of encrypted programming comms to the PLC in the new 1200/1500, and I think Rockwell added some kind of security in the whole 20.3 fiasco.
The pinless backplane is a cool concept, but, again, I'm not sure what the reason for it is (although 4gb/s is crazy fast). Bent pins have never been that much of a concern to me. The whole idea is way out there, it's like some PC designer/security geek who had never worked with a PLC designed one from scratch. Nothing wrong with that, they just don't do a good job on the website of explaining the customer benefits of the features they brag about.
