Blockchain-enabled balise data security for train control system

Abstract

The train control system is the railway system's brain, ensuring the train protection and the railway network's operating performance. This control system relies on the balise data received via near-field wireless communication to localize the train and update real-time operating conditions and constraints. The attackers can capture these data through their balise antenna and corrupt them through replay or false data injection attacks. This corrupted data can compromise train safety and jeopardize the entire train fleet operations. To overcome these attacks and to ensure the trustworthiness of balise and data integrity, this study proposes the permissioned blockchain-enabled two novel architectures for data transactions. Besides, each balise is equipped with a novel built-in blockchain cryptography algorithm to create its secret and public keys to provide the key integrity without needing third-party Certification Authority of conventional Public-Key Infrastructure based security systems. Each balise can create the unique signature using a ‘nonce’ signal sent by the train control system in the static architecture or using a self-generated ‘k-once’ secret key per train control system in dynamic architecture. Finally, the case studies are carried out to confirm the security sufficiency of the proposed architectures.