Vysiion has been appointed by South East Water to deliver a new communications network for its IT (information technology) and OT (operational technology) assets, ahead of the public switched telephone network (PSTN) switch-off in January 2027.
The work by Vysiion – an Exponential-e Group company – will be conducted under the South East Water Wide Area Network (WAN) Infrastructure and Support Services contract, running for five years with the option of a five year extension.
South East Water’s existing network will be replaced and Vysiion will provide a “fully managed hybrid SD-WAN (software-defined wide area network)”.
The new network will “span over 300 geographically dispersed estate locations, including offices, depots, water treatment works, pumping stations and remote rural facilities, that depend on secure and reliable connectivity to support both IT services and operational technology, including Scada (supervisory control and data acquisition) telemetry and control systems and CCTV”.
According to the UK Government, “in November 2017, the telecoms industry announced its intention to retire analogue telephone networks such as the public switched telephone network (PSTN), which provides many analogue telephone services.”
It adds that the telecoms industry would be upgrading landline services “to new digital technology using an internet connection, such as voice over internet protocol (Voip), Digital Voice or All-IP telephony”.
Vysiion said that South East Water’s PSTN-dependent locations would be “prioritised as part of the initial rollout, supporting South East Water’s controlled migration away from legacy analogue services before the planned January 2027 switch-off”.
The contractor expects to provide the water company with “a combination of fixed-line, fibre, 4G/5G and satellite connectivity, selecting the most appropriate primary and secondary services for each location” as a replacement for PSTN.
Vysiion added that by providing “physical and logical diversity between connections” it would help South East Water “remove single points of failure and maintain operational services if an individual carrier or connectivity method is disrupted”.
The upgraded network is designed to help South East Water to align with the National Cyber Security Centre’s (NCSC’s) cyber assessment framework.
“It will provide centralised management, end-to-end encryption and secure separation between corporate IT and operational technology traffic, while enabling automatic failover and intelligent routing across available connections,” Vysiion added.
Earlier in November, the NCSC warned that it is “highly likely AI malware will be used in a ransomware attack on UK critical national infrastructure (CNI)” and the head of the centre said it could happen within two years.
The risk of a cyber attack against the UK’s water infrastructure was described in the government’s National Risk Register 2026.
“The reasonable worst‑case scenario assumes an advanced cyber actor infiltrates the OT systems of a water company,” it said.
“The attacker deploys malware that erases critical data and disables key components controlling essential operational functions.
“This results in the water company losing visibility and control of its systems, causing a major disruption to water supply and wastewater services for a large population.”
The register said the risk of such an attack had a likelihood of 5-25% within the 10 years and would have a “moderate” impact, which could mean 41-200 fatalities and hundreds of millions of pounds of economic losses.
South East Water head of IT Darryl Mitchell said: “Reliable and secure connectivity is fundamental to the operation of our water network.
“With the support of Vysiion, we are now creating a stronger foundation from which to manage our critical assets, prepare for stronger resilience expectations and deliver a better service to our customers.”
Vysiion CEO Peter Clapton said: “Resilience cannot depend on a single carrier or connectivity technology, particularly when a network interruption can affect the systems used to manage water treatment and distribution.
“Working with South East Water, we are delivering a network that uses the most appropriate combination of fixed-line, mobile and satellite connectivity at each location.”
Clapton added: “The result will be a secure, centrally managed and highly resilient platform that supports South East Water’s operational needs today while providing the flexibility required for future innovation.”
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