Unit 3 — Detections as evidence
12 minA detection is evidence for a requirement
How each plant alert is placed in exactly one zone and attached to one foundational requirement, with a reason.
By the end you can
- Given an alert, name its zone and the requirement it is evidence for.
- Explain why the zone is the one that raised it, not the one that was harmed.
- Read a conduit label on a boundary finding.
One alert, one zone, one requirement
Every detection the plant range raises is placed in exactly one zone, and the placement carries a reason written in the plant's terms. That is what makes the alert usable in an assessment: it is not just a red row, it is a statement that a named requirement in a named zone did or did not hold.
| Detection (zone) | Requirement, technique and reason |
|---|---|
| Write function code from a host registered as read-only (Z-CONTROL) | FR1 · T0836 — The write lands on a controller inside the line control zone. Whatever sent it, the identification failure is measured where the command took effect. |
| Fill weight above tolerance on line 2 (Z-CONTROL) | FR3 · T0831 — Fill weight is the process the control zone owns; the deviation is the integrity finding for that zone, not for the historian that reported it. |
| Setpoint moved twice within thirty seconds — faster than an operator works (Z-CONTROL) | FR6 · T0855 — A step rate no operator could work at is judged against the panel that is supposed to be the only source of setpoints. |
| New MAC learned on a patch-panel port that belongs to the office side (Z-CONTROL) | FR5 · T0822 — The address was learned on a plant-side patch panel port, so the control zone is the one whose restricted data flow has been broken. |
| Plant-side host has no session through the OT DMZ (Z-DMZ) | FR5 · T0822 — The finding is an absence in the DMZ: the plant-side session has no brokered leg, so the zone that should have carried it has nothing to show. |
| Device identification read from an address not in the asset register (Z-CONTROL) | FR1 · T0846 — Device identification is read off controllers in the control zone, and the unknown address is missing from that zone's register. |
| Safety controller key switch reported in PROGRAM (Z-SAFETY) | FR2 · T0858 — The key switch is the safety zone's own state, and PROGRAM during a run is the profile breach by itself. |
| Force active on interlock IL-7, refreshed on a keep-alive (Z-SAFETY) | FR3 · T0878 — An interlock force lives in the safety instrumented system and nowhere else. |
| Pressure above trip point, trip suppressed by active force (Z-SAFETY) | FR7 · T0880 — A trip point reached without a trip is the safety zone failing its availability requirement in the only way that matters. |
| Controller mode changed RUN to PROGRAM during a production run (Z-CONTROL) | FR2 · T0858 — RUN to PROGRAM is a use-control decision about a controller in the line control zone during production. |
| Program download from a host that is not the licensed engineering workstation (Z-OPS) | FR2 · T0843 — The licensed engineering workstation lives in site operations, so a download from anywhere else is that zone's identification failure before it is the controller's. |
| HMI lost communications with the capper mid-transfer (Z-CONTROL) | FR3 · T0857 — Loss of view sits with the panel and controller pair in the control zone, which is where the operator notices it. |
| Capper controller stopped answering its poll — line function unavailable (Z-CONTROL) | FR7 · T0814 — A controller that stops answering its poll is a control-zone availability finding. |
| Control protocol from an address with no asset-register entry (Z-CONTROL) | FR1 · T0848 — Control protocol from an address with no register entry is measured in the zone whose register it should have been in. |
Where the alert is filed
The zone is where the finding is observable and owned — the zone whose profile it breaches — not always the zone that ends up harmed. A dual-homed laptop is an enterprise finding even though the danger is to the control zone, because the enterprise profile is the one that says no office host holds a plant address.