In the maritime sector, the integration of radar systems, Automatic Identification System (AIS) and Electronic Chart Display and Information System (ECDIS) through digital technologies enables several benefits to maritime operations, but also make ships prone to cyberattacks. In this context, this work investigates the feasibility of an attacker using a radar system or AIS as open door to remotely send commands to a cyber threat hosted on a ship, even if the ship’s systems are air gapped—i.e., are not connected to other networks. The received commands are intended to trigger a cyber threat located in the ship. Although the literature covers several analyzes on cyber risks and vulnerabilities in naval systems, it lacks exploiting mechanisms capable of acknowledging attack commands received through radar and AIS. To this end, this work proposes a triggering mechanism that uses a template matching technique to detect specific patterns transmitted by the attacker to the ship’s radar or AIS. The results show the effectiveness of the proposed technique as a tool to acknowledge the received attack commands and activate a malicious code previously installed on the ship. In the case of attacks on a radar system, the accuracy achieved by the proposed method is 0.90. In the case of attacks on an AIS/ECDIS setup it presents an accuracy of 0.93. In both cases the proposed mechanism maintains the due safety against accidental attack activations.

Industrial control systems (ICS) include networked control systems (NCS), which use Real-Time Ethernet (RTE) protocols since many years, well before the Time Sensitive Networking (TSN) initiative debut. Today, Ethernet based control systems are used all across Industry 4.0, including in critical applications, allowing for straight integration with IT layers. Even if it is known that current RTE protocols do not have strong authentication or ciphering options, it is still very challenging to perform undetected cyber-attacks to these protocols while the NSC is in operation, in particular because such attacks must comply with very strict and small temporal constraints. In this paper, a model based attack is proposed for service degradation of NCS. The attack is carried out in real-time and it can remain undetected for the entire plant life. The attack can be applied to any RTE protocols and, without loss of generality, a detailed analysis of stealth techniques is provided for a specific real use case based on PROFINET. The experimental results demonstrate the feasibility of the proposed attack and its high effectiveness. The paper also points out some possible future investigation directions in order to mitigate the attack.

Smart meters are a vital part of the smart grid, enabling energy management, real-time control, and data collection. Despite advances in technology, there is still a lack of content and limited understanding of the specific cybersecurity threats facing these devices, as well as the effectiveness of existing mitigation strategies. This study analyzed 41 articles sourced from three academic databases (Scopus, Web of Science, and IEEE Xplore). A cutting-edge study was conducted, including a comprehensive review of relevant literature on smart meters, cybersecurity vulnerabilities, and mitigation strategies. Elements were selected based on pre-assessment and classification processes, and the data were extracted and combined to provide detailed insights into the new devices. The study identified several significant cybersecurity risks for smart meters, including data breaches, unauthorized access, data manipulation, denial-of-service (DoS) attacks, and malware introduction. The study also highlighted the vulnerabilities exploited by these threats, such as undocumented communications, weak authentication, and outdated software. Recommended mitigation strategies include strengthening access and authentication mechanisms, securing communication systems, regular software updates, code management, anomaly detection, and access control. The findings indicate that although there are good strategies and methods to mitigate these cyber threats, significant research gaps remain. These gaps include design requirements, software and firmware updates, physical security, the use of big data to detect vulnerabilities, user data privacy, and inconsistencies in machine learning algorithms. Future research should focus on these aspects to improve the stability and reliability of smart meters.

The growing demand for solutions related to measurement (e.g., digital sensors, smart meters, distributed measuring systems) imposes several concerns about information and process reliability. In this context, blockchain can play a crucial role as a platform to implement applications and activities in the context of legal metrology. In most countries, the National Metrology Institutes (NMIs) are responsible for promoting these initiatives. Thus, in this paper, we present a functional architecture to integrate NMIs in a collaborative blockchain network. We discuss the main aspects and features that an inter-NMI blockchain network must deliver. Furthermore, we implement our proposal using the Hyperledger Fabric platform. We connect peers from Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt (PTB) (German NMI) and the National Institute of Metrology, Quality, and Technology (Inmetro) (Brazilian NMI) in a useful application that consists of a blockchain-based public-key infrastructure to identify and authenticate smart meters. Our preliminary results demonstrate that the proposed architecture meets the main requirements imposed by applications involving measurements. Furthermore, it opens the opportunity to integrate NMIs from other countries into the project, constituting an important global initiative in the metrology field.