| Title | Blockchain-Enabled Security Module for Transforming Conventional Inverters toward Firmware Security-Enhanced Smart Inverters |
| Publication Type | Conference Paper |
| Year of Publication | 2021 |
| Authors | Ahn, Bohyun, Bere, Gomanth, Ahmad, Seerin, Choi, JinChun, Kim, Taesic, Park, Sung-won |
| Conference Name | 2021 IEEE Energy Conversion Congress and Exposition (ECCE) |
| Date Published | Oct. 2021 |
| Publisher | IEEE |
| ISBN Number | 978-1-7281-5135-9 |
| Keywords | blockchain, blockchains, composability, cybersecurity, defense, Energy conversion, firmware security, Hardware, information and communication technology, Inverters, Malware, Metrics, pubcrawl, resilience, Resiliency, Security Module, smart contracts, smart inverter, static malware analysis, Zero day attacks |
| Abstract | As the traditional inverters are transforming toward more intelligent inverters with advanced information and communication technologies, the cyber-attack surface has been remarkably expanded. Specifically, securing firmware of smart inverters from cyber-attacks is crucial. This paper provides expanded firmware attack surface targeting smart inverters. Moreover, this paper proposes a security module for transforming a conventional inverter to a firmware security built-in smart inverter by preventing potential malware and unauthorized firmware update attacks as well as fast automated inverter recovery from zero-day attacks. Furthermore, the proposed security module as a client of blockchain is connected to blockchain severs to fully utilize blockchain technologies such as membership service, ledgers, and smart contracts to detect and mitigate the firmware attacks. The proposed security module framework is implemented in an Internet-of-Thing (IoT) device and validated by experiments. |
| URL | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9595728 |
| DOI | 10.1109/ECCE47101.2021.9595728 |
| Citation Key | ahn_blockchain-enabled_2021 |
Blockchain-Enabled Security Module for Transforming Conventional Inverters toward Firmware Security-Enhanced Smart Inverters