Ömer Sen

Ömer Sen, Dennis van der Velde, Philipp Linnartz et al.

With the increasing use of information and communication technology in electrical power grids, the security of energy supply is increasingly threatened by cyber-attacks. Traditional cyber-security measures, such as firewalls or intrusion detection/prevention systems, can be used as mitigation and prevention measures, but their effective use requires a deep understanding of the potential threat landscape and complex attack processes in energy information systems. Given the complexity and lack of detailed knowledge of coordinated, timed attacks in smart grid applications, we need information and insight into realistic attack scenarios in an appropriate and practical setting. In this paper, we present a man-in-the-middle-based attack scenario that intercepts process communication between control systems and field devices, employs false data injection techniques, and performs data corruption such as sending false commands to field devices. We demonstrate the applicability of the presented attack scenario in a physical smart grid laboratory environment and analyze the generated data under normal and attack conditions to extract domain-specific knowledge for detection mechanisms.

Ömer Sen, Dennis van der Velde, Sebastian N. Peters et al.

While the digitization of power distribution grids brings many benefits, it also introduces new vulnerabilities for cyber-attacks. To maintain secure operations in the emerging threat landscape, detecting and implementing countermeasures against cyber-attacks are paramount. However, due to the lack of publicly available attack data against Smart Grids (SGs) for countermeasure development, simulation-based data generation approaches offer the potential to provide the needed data foundation. Therefore, our proposed approach provides flexible and scalable replication of multi-staged cyber-attacks in an SG Co-Simulation Environment (COSE). The COSE consists of an energy grid simulator, simulators for Operation Technology (OT) devices, and a network emulator for realistic IT process networks. Focusing on defensive and offensive use cases in COSE, our simulated attacker can perform network scans, find vulnerabilities, exploit them, gain administrative privileges, and execute malicious commands on OT devices. As an exemplary countermeasure, we present a built-in Intrusion Detection System (IDS) that analyzes generated network traffic using anomaly detection with Machine Learning (ML) approaches. In this work, we provide an overview of the SG COSE, present a multi-stage attack model with the potential to disrupt grid operations, and show exemplary performance evaluations of the IDS in specific scenarios.