"Smart Inverters' Vulnerability to Cyberattacks Needs to Be Identified and Countered, According to Concordia Researchers"
Distributed Energy Resources (DERs) are facilities owned by individuals or small businesses that can generate, store, and return power to energy grids, thus changing how power is used. As society seeks alternative energy sources, the technology is becoming more prevalent, but its growth has created a new field of vulnerabilities that invite cyberattacks. In order to interface with power grids, DERs such as home-based solar panels or electric vehicle chargers rely on field devices known as smart inverters. According to a new study conducted by researchers at Concordia University, these devices' reliance on digital information and communication technology can be attacked in various ways by malicious actors, posing serious consequences for the public. The researchers surveyed the smart inverter cybersecurity landscape and identified attack strategies at the device and grid levels. They also explored how to defend against, mitigate, and avoid these attack strategies. The researchers have described how attacks on smart inverters can take different forms, ranging from threats to individual devices to threats to the entire grid. Device attacks can disrupt communications between the device and the utility regulating energy flow, as well as with other devices, but hardware attacks are also possible. Reconnaissance, replay attacks, Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) attacks, and Man-in-the-Middle (MITM) attacks could all be performed on communications links between the inverters and devices. Physical firmware attacks and hall spoofing, which involves manipulating electromagnetic fields around a device, are examples of tactics that target hardware. The researchers noted the possibility of cyberattacks on centralized control architectures and distributed control systems at the microgrid level. Many of these attacks involve injecting false data into the communications stream between the device and the regulator or preventing commands from being sent from the controller to the devices. These can cause power, voltage, and frequency oscillations, potentially hindering the microgrid's ability to distribute energy. This article continues to discuss the study on the cybersecurity of smart inverters in the smart grid.