A Survey on the Security Vulnerabilities in the Cyber-Physical Power Systems

Abstract

The establishment of the cyber-physical power systems (CPPS) laid by the integration of the operation technology (OT) with the information technology (IT) enabled optimal control of the grid. However, the secure integration of the OT and IT domains remains a challenge. There are several zones in the CPPS that attackers can target to gain access to critical functionalities of the CPPS. In this paper, we explore a few of such unsecured zones that can serve as the access points of the attacks. The study is conducted by considering the Automatic Generation Control (AGC) systems of the CPPS, whose one of the key roles is to maintain the frequency stability of the grid. As the operation of the AGC is critical to system reliability, attackers can exploit the vulnerabilities of the CPPS to corrupt the AGC functionality. Although numerous studies exist concerning attack detection in the AGC system, rigorous research on how the attackers can target the system is missing. Therefore, this paper surveys the security loopholes that the attackers can target to corrupt the power system frequency stability.