Two questions often come up when we talk to security-minded customers. Here is how Scout 137 and the Scout Portal answer them.
Customers evaluating Scout 137 regularly raise two concerns:
- can the data link be intercepted during an inspection, and
- can data be stolen from Scout Portal, our cloud platform?
Both are reasonable questions, and the Scout 137 architecture has clear answers for each.
A fully wired path
Most industrial drones rely on radio communication. The control link, video feed and telemetry all travel over the air, where they can be intercepted, disrupted or manipulated by anyone with the right equipment.
The Scout 137 does not work that way. It is a fully tethered system. The tether carries both power and signal, so every byte (control commands, video, LiDAR and ultrasonic measurements) moves through a physical connection between the drone and the ground station. Eavesdropping is not a relevant scenario.
Furthermore, the drone does not contain a GPS/GNSS receiver, making GPS spoofing irrelevant. For operators working inside power plants, offshore installations or defence facilities, that is a meaningful security baseline.
A safety bonus
The fully wired path delivers operational benefits too. The tether supplies continuous power, so the drone cannot run out of battery mid-flight and become stranded inside a tank, silo or pressure vessel. That removes a real fire hazard. A lost lithium battery in a confined space is not an attractive situation. The same physical link also guarantees a stable connection, so the operator never loses contact with the drone, even deep inside steel structures where radio simply does not propagate.
Offline by Default
Inspection data is written to the SD card in the drone during the flight, and nothing leaves the card unless the operator chooses to upload it. The system stays offline from start to finish unless the WAN port on the ground station is deliberately connected. All the inspection data stays on the SD card. Handle it the way you handle any other sensitive media.
For organisations that require a strict air gap, no special configuration is required. Simply leave the WAN port disconnected. There is nothing to switch off, disable or lock down to operate offline.
Scout Portal: Microsoft Azure, ISO 27001
When ScoutDI customers want to process the point cloud, review imagery and UT measurements, or collaborate with internal teams and third parties, the data is uploaded to Scout Portal. The platform runs on Microsoft Azure, hosted in European data centres, with encryption of data at rest and in transit, robust identity and access management, continuous threat monitoring and compliance with major international standards.
ScoutDI as a company is ISO 27001 certified, which means our information security management is independently audited against the global benchmark.
When the cloud is not an option
We are aware that not every organisation is comfortable storing data in a commercial cloud, regardless of how well it is secured. Data sovereignty, geopolitical considerations and sector-specific rules can rule the option out entirely. Two answers apply. First, the offline workflow above is always available: the SD card never has to leave the site. Second, we are actively exploring local and customer-managed deployments of Scout Portal for operators with the right requirements. We will not promise a specific timeline here, but it is a real conversation we are having with serious customers.
Secure by design from the moment of capture, with a deliberately offline default and a vetted cloud when you want one. That is the Scout 137 approach to data security.
Conclusion
As industries continue to digitalize their inspection processes, the importance of secure data handling cannot be overstated. At ScoutDI, data security is not treated as an add-on feature, but as a fundamental design principle.
From a fully wired communication path to offline-by-default operation and controlled data sharing, the Scout 137 is designed to give operators control over where inspection data resides and how it is handled.
Whether operating entirely offline or leveraging the secure capabilities of the Scout Portal, organisations can trust that their inspection data remains protected at every stage.
