Secure Smart Energy Systems
Cybersecurity and Resilience in Energy Systems
Smart energy systems are a key to energy innovations and elementary building blocks of our energy future. They are present in vehicles, at home, at work and embedded in our environment. Energy systems ensure a reliable, sustainable and affordable energy supply through the optimal integration of local and central means for energy generation, storage, distribution and usage. Treating energy as the fuel of our society, they open new markets for services, applications and solutions.
Security and Resilience in Energy Systems
Energy systems are »critical infrastructures« and attacks can lead to major economic damage and threaten lives. National security laws therefore stipulate the implementation of adequate protective measures. The overall resilience of a smart energy system plays a particularly important role: the system must perform its service under adverse conditions (e.g., during an attack), protect important data and be fully recoverable. Consequently, trustworthiness, confidentiality as well as privacy and data protection are becoming increasingly relevant.
The five challenges for »security and resilience« can be summarized as:
- lack of protection for devices in the field
- distributed control and guidance systems
- inadequate IT security standards
- highly sensitive user data
- multiple stakeholders and interests.
Effectiveness, Efficiency and Scalability
IT security measures must consider some unique properties of smart energy systems: resource restrictions and accessibility of embedded systems, real-time requirements for services, energy and cost efficiency, high diversity and heterogenous systems as well as a dynamic and fast-growing scale.
We advocate for approaches that consider and include security by design. Furthermore, data protection measures (privacy by design) will also be a prerequisite for smart energy systems that need to be aware of data avoidance, economy, transparency and sovereignty.
Our Services
Fraunhofer SIT has many years of experience in consulting and performing security analyzes and is pioneering in the research and development of resilient and trustworthy systems. We offer you:
- Threat analysis according to standards, regulations, norms and best practices
- Formal verification and analysis of hard and software systems
- Development of security solutions for resilience, trust, and privacy
- Technology analysis, supplier evaluation, feasibility studies
- Testing, certification, and standardization
- R&D services for smart energy topics including smart grid, smart metering/-gateway, smart home, and e-mobility
- Workshops and trainings
Our customers
- Technology providers and suppliers gain increased customer trust and acceptance with built-in security during their product development and beat their competition with excellent research and expertise. We identify security requirements and meet them with robust hardware and software solutions so that new technologies reach the market quickly. We test security measures and ensure that your product can be securely integrated.
- System developers benefit from a security-aware design and development process that minimizes vulnerabilities and reduces patch and update cycles. We offer a broad spectrum of services including software design and validation, feasibility studies and proof-of-concept implementations of customized security measures.
- Manufacturers and solution providers conduct studies, develop new ideas or design entirely new products together with our experts for smart grid, smart home and e-mobility. We assist you with applied research and development and help you integrate solutions and meet security requirements.
- Operators and service providers work with us to develop a catalog of criteria for secure and resilient services, evaluate suppliers, and train personnel. We focus on secure operation and provision of services, security management for distributed systems, as well as the orchestration of different security measures on all system levels.
Projects
SecDER – “Fault detection and resilience for decentralized energy resources.” under a grant for applied research and development for non-nuclear energy research programs »Anwendungsorientierte nicht-nukleare FuE im 7. Energieforschungsprogramm«.
Fraunhofer CINES – Fraunhofer Cluster of Excellence: »Integrated Energy Systems«. The Fraunhofer research cluster solves central technological and economical challenges in the energy transition. The cluster aims to complete the integration of variable renewables in our energy system and market space. Fraunhofer CINES pools the strengths of the most excellent institutions for applied energy research within the Fraunhofer Society.
Contact
Dr.-Ing. Thorsten Henkel
Provisional Head of Cyber-Physical Systems and Automotive Security
64295 Darmstadt
White paper
Microgrid Systems: Towards a Technical Performance Assessment Frame