Power-Based Non-Intrusive Condition Monitoring for Terminal Device in Smart Grid.

Guoming Zhang,Wenyuan Xu,Xiaoyu Ji,Yanjie Li

doi:10.3390/s20133635

Abstract

As a critical component in the smart grid, the Distribution Terminal Unit (DTU) dynamically adjusts the running status of the entire smart grid based on the collected electrical parameters to ensure the safe and stable operation of the smart grid. However, as a real-time embedded device, DTU has not only resource constraints but also specific requirements on real-time performance, thus, the traditional anomaly detection method cannot be deployed. To detect the tamper of the program running on DTU, we proposed a power-based non-intrusive condition monitoring method that collects and analyzes the power consumption of DTU using power sensors and machine learning (ML) techniques, the feasibility of this approach is that the power consumption is closely related to the executing code in CPUs, that is when the execution code is tampered with, the power consumption changes accordingly. To validate this idea, we set up a testbed based on DTU and simulated four types of imperceptible attacks that change the code running in ARM and DSP processors, respectively. We generate representative features and select lightweight ML algorithms to detect these attacks. We finally implemented the detection system on the windows and ubuntu platform and validated its effectiveness. The results show that the detection accuracy is up to 99.98% in a non-intrusive and lightweight way.

Highlights

With the rapid development of smart grids, information and communication technologies are widely applied to smart grids, which makes it more complex in structure and inevitably introduces more security issues
We propose a power-based non-intrusive anomaly detection method to detect the executing program change of distribution terminal unit (DTU) using a machine learning method without introducing security issues and affecting the real-time performance of the system
We found that when the program has been falsified, even the behavior of the DTU looks normal, the power consumption will change

Summary

Introduction

With the rapid development of smart grids, information and communication technologies are widely applied to smart grids, which makes it more complex in structure and inevitably introduces more security issues. The cyberattack on the Ukraine power grid is a typical smart grid attack event that utilized BlackEnergy version 3 to make seven 110 and 2335 kV substations disconnected for three hours [1]. Due to the limited resources of those terminal devices, the traditional security detection method cannot be deployed, making it difficult to detect if the device has been compromised. As a critical data collection, communication, and control unit in the smart grid, as shown, once the distribution terminal unit (DTU) is attacked and does not detect in time, it will cause undesirable and often severe economic losses and may even cause major casualties. As a critical data collection, communication, and control unit in the smart grid, as shown in Figure 1, once the distribution terminal unit (DTU) is attacked and does not detect in time, it will cause undesirable and often severe economic losses and may even cause major casualties.

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion