CYBERSECURITY IN THE ENERGY SECTOR: AN OVERVIEW OF DEFENSE STRATEGIES AND BEST PRACTICES

ავტორი: Inda Kreso

ორგანიზაცია: University of Sarajevo

კატეგორია:

საკვანძო სიტყვები: cybersecurity, defense strategies, energy sector, energy infrastructure, cyber threats in energy sector

აბსტრაქტი. In the digital scene of today’s world, securing vital infrastructure against cyber-attacks is absolutely crucial. Energy sector is one of the most important systems for every country, hence it is imperative to keep energy infrastructure strong and safe. The nature of the warfare has changed in the present digital era due to digitalization, and hybrid warfare usually results in attacks on energy infrastructure. Those attacks on the energy infrastructure are mainly cyber-attacks. While preserving energy infrastructure depends on strong defense strategies, it is even more critical to grasp the constraints and difficulties of the existing defenses in the context of cybersecurity. This paper analyses the best strategies advised in the literature for safeguarding important energy infrastructure against cyber-attacks using a rigorous literature review. This paper also analyses how cybersecurity techniques are included into Smart Grid systems, energy infrastructure and the difficulties and restrictions of current defense strategies. Knowing the limits of defense strategies investigated in the literature can help in improving defense mechanism and strengthening national security.

სტატიის მთლიანად ნახვა

ბიბლიოგრაფია

Adebimpe Bolatito Ige, Eseoghene Kupa, and Oluwatosin Ilori. 2024a. “Analyzing Defense Strategies against Cyber Risks in the Energy Sector: Enhancing the Security of Renewable Energy Sources.” International Journal of Science and Research Archive 12 (1): 2978–95. https://doi.org/10.30574/ijsra.2024.12.1.1186

2024b. “Best Practices in Cybersecurity for Green Building Management Systems: Protecting Sustainable Infrastructure from Cyber Threats.” International Journal of Science and Research Archive 12 (1): 2960–77. https://doi.org/10.30574/ijsra.2024.12.1.1185

Ajayi, Olanrewaju, Chisom Alozie, and Olumese Abieba. 2025. “Enhancing Cybersecurity in Energy Infrastructure: Strategies for Safeguarding Critical Systems in the Digital Age.” Trends in Renewable Energy 11 (2): 201–12. https://doi.org/10.17737/tre.2025.11.2.00192

Alghassab, Mohammed. 2022. “Analyzing the Impact of Cybersecurity on Monitoring and Control Systems in the Energy Sector.” Energies 15 (1). https://doi.org/10.3390/en15010218

Allende, Pedro M.., Andrew. Gumbiner, and John La. Rue. 2022. Securing the Energy Transition against Cyber Threats : Report of the Atlantic Council Task Force on Cybersecurity and the Energy Transition. Atlantic Council

Alotaibi, Ibrahim, Mohammed A. Abido, Muhammad Khalid, and Andrey V. Savkin. 2020. “A Comprehensive Review of Recent Advances in Smart Grids: A Sustainable Future with Renewable Energy Resources.” Energies. MDPI AG. https://doi.org/10.3390/en13236269

Alqudhaibi, Adel, Majed Albarrak, Abdulmohsan Aloseel, Sandeep Jagtap, and Konstantinos Salonitis. 2023. “Predicting Cybersecurity Threats in Critical Infrastructure for Industry 4.0: A Proactive Approach Based on Attacker Motivations.” Sensors 23 (9). https://doi.org/10.3390/s23094539

Aydın, Zühre. 2025. “Detecting Cybersecurity Threats in Digital Energy Systems Using Deep Learning for Imbalanced Datasets.” International Journal of Energy Economics and Policy 15 (3): 614–28. https://doi.org/10.32479/ijeep.19649

Baggott, Sean S., and Joost R. Santos. 2020. “A Risk Analysis Framework for Cyber Security and Critical Infrastructure Protection of the U.S. Electric Power Grid.” Risk Analysis 40 (9): 1744–61. https://doi.org/10.1111/risa.13511.

Berttgordijn, Markusschristen, and Micheleeloi Editors. 2020. “The Ethics Of.” http://www.springer.com/series/7761

Boeding, Matthew, Kelly Boswell, Michael Hempel, Hamid Sharif, Juan Lopez, and Kalyan Perumalla. 2022. “Survey of Cybersecurity Governance, Threats, and Countermeasures for the Power Grid.” Energies 15 (22). https://doi.org/10.3390/en15228692

Darlington Eze Ekechukwu, and Peter Simpa. 2024. “The Future of Cybersecurity in Renewable Energy Systems: A Review, Identifying Challenges and Proposing Strategic Solutions.” Computer Science & IT Research Journal 5 (6): 1265–99. https://doi.org/10.51594/csitrj.v5i6.1197

Dawson, Maurice, Robert Bacius, Luis Borges Gouveia, and Andreas Vassilakos. 2021. “Understanding the Challenge of Cybersecurity in Critical Infrastructure Sectors.” Land Forces Academy Review 26 (1): 69–75. https://doi.org/10.2478/raft-2021-0011

Ding, Jianguo, Attia Qammar, Zhimin Zhang, Ahmad Karim, and Huansheng Ning. 2022. “Cyber Threats to Smart Grids: Review, Taxonomy, Potential Solutions, and Future Directions.” Energies 15 (18). https://doi.org/10.3390/en15186799

Ghelani, Diptiben. 2022. “Cyber Security in Smart Grids, Threats, and Possible Solutions.” American Journal of Applied Scientific Research x, No. x. https://doi.org/10.11648/j.XXXX.2022XXXX.XX

Gitelman, Lazar, Elena Magaril, and Mikhail Kozhevnikov. 2023. “Energy Security: New Threats and Solutions.” Energies. MDPI. https://doi.org/10.3390/en16062869

Gunduz, Muhammed Zekeriya, and Resul Das. 2020. “Cyber-Security on Smart Grid: Threats and Potential Solutions.” Computer Networks 169 (March). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.comnet.2019.107094

Ibrahim, Ahmed, Craig Valli, Ian McAteer, and Junaid Chaudhry. 2018. “A Security Review of Local Government Using NIST CSF: A Case Study.” Journal of Supercomputing 74 (10): 5171–86. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11227-018-2479-2

Islam, Shama Naz, Zubair Baig, and Sherali Zeadally. 2019. “Physical Layer Security for the Smart Grid: Vulnerabilities, Threats, and Countermeasures.” IEEE Transactions on Industrial Informatics 15 (12): 6522–30. https://doi.org/10.1109/TII.2019.2931436

Israel Uzoagba, Chibuike, and BY Chibuike Israel Uzoagba. 2024. “ENERGY GRID RESILIENCE AND CYBER SECURITY.” https://www.researchgate.net/publication/381610122

Kimani, Kenneth, Vitalice Oduol, and Kibet Langat. 2019. “Cyber Security Challenges for IoT-Based Smart Grid Networks.” International Journal of Critical Infrastructure Protection 25 (June):36–49. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijcip.2019.01.001

Krause, Tim, Raphael Ernst, Benedikt Klaer, Immanuel Hacker, and Martin Henze. 2021. “Cybersecurity in Power Grids: Challenges and Opportunities.” Sensors 21 (18). https://doi.org/10.3390/s21186225

Le, Tan Duy, Adnan Anwar, Seng W. Loke, Razvan Beuran, and Yasuo Tan. 2020. “Grid Attacksim: A Cyber Attack Simulation Framework for Smart Grids.” Electronics (Switzerland) 9 (8): 1–21. https://doi.org/10.3390/electronics9081218

Le, Tan Duy, Mengmeng Ge, Adnan Anwar, Seng W. Loke, Razvan Beuran, Robin Doss, and Yasuo Tan. 2022. “GridAttackAnalyzer: A Cyber Attack Analysis Framework for Smart Grids.” Sensors 22 (13). https://doi.org/10.3390/s22134795

Leszczyna, Rafał. 2018. “A Review of Standards with Cybersecurity Requirements for Smart Grid.” Computers and Security. Elsevier Ltd. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cose.2018.03.011

2019. “Standards with Cybersecurity Controls for Smart Grid—A Systematic Analysis.” International Journal of Communication Systems 32 (6). https://doi.org/10.1002/dac.3910

Mohamed, Nachaat, Adel Oubelaid, and Saif Khameis Almazrouei. 2023. “Staying Ahead of Threats: A Review of AI and Cyber Security in Power Generation and Distribution.” International Journal of Electrical and Electronics Research. Forex Publication. https://doi.org/10.37391/ijeer.110120

Mohammadi, Fazel. 2021. “Emerging Challenges in Smart Grid Cybersecurity Enhancement: A Review.” Energies. MDPI AG. https://doi.org/10.3390/en14051380.

Mrabet, Zakaria El, Naima Kaabouch, Hassan El Ghazi, and Hamid El Ghazi. 2018. “Cyber-Security in Smart Grid: Survey and Challenges.” Computers and Electrical Engineering 67 (April):469–82. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compeleceng.2018.01.015

National Institute of Standards and Technology. 2018. “Framework for Improving Critical Infrastructure Cybersecurity.” Gaithersburg, MD. https://doi.org/10.6028/NIST.CSWP.04162018

Peng, Chen, Hongtao Sun, Mingjin Yang, and Yu Long Wang. 2019. “A Survey on Security Communication and Control for Smart Grids under Malicious Cyber Attacks.” IEEE Transactions on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics: Systems 49 (8): 1554–69. https://doi.org/10.1109/TSMC.2018.2884952.

Pinto, Smitha Joyce, Pierluigi Siano, and Mimmo Parente. 2023. “Review of Cybersecurity Analysis in Smart Distribution Systems and Future Directions for Using Unsupervised Learning Strategies for Cyber Detection.” Energies. MDPI. https://doi.org/10.3390/en16041651

Plėta, Tomas, Manuela Tvaronavičienė, Silvia Della Casa, and Konstantin Agafonov. 2020. “Cyber-Attacks to Critical Energy Infrastructure and Management Issues: Overview of Selected Cases.” Insights into Regional Development 2 (3): 703–15. https://doi.org/10.9770/ird.2020.2.3(7).

Priyadarshini, Ishaani, Raghvendra Kumar, Rohit Sharma, Pradeep Kumar Singh, and Suresh Chandra Satapathy. 2021. “Identifying Cyber Insecurities in Trustworthy Space and Energy Sector for Smart Grids.” Computers and Electrical Engineering 93 (July). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compeleceng.2021.107204

Radoglou-Grammatikis, Panagiotis I., and Panagiotis G. Sarigiannidis. 2019. “Securing the Smart Grid: A Comprehensive Compilation of Intrusion Detection and Prevention Systems.” IEEE Access 7:46595–620. https://doi.org/10.1109/ACCESS.2019.2909807

Singh, Neeraj Kumar, and Vasundhara Mahajan. 2021. “Analysis and Evaluation of Cyber-Attack Impact on Critical Power System Infrastructure.” Smart Science 9 (1): 1–13. https://doi.org/10.1080/23080477.2020.1861502

Smith, Don C. 2021. “Cybersecurity in the Energy Sector: Are We Really Prepared?” Journal of Energy and Natural Resources Law. Taylor and Francis Ltd. https://doi.org/10.1080/02646811.2021.1943935

Stoyanov, Evstatiev, and Iliev. 2018. Analysis of the Cybersecurity Threats in Smart Grid. IEEE

Strojny, Jacek, Anna Krakowiak-Bal, Jarosław Knaga, and Piotr Kacorzyk. 2023. “Energy Security: A Conceptual Overview.” Energies. Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute (MDPI). https://doi.org/10.3390/en16135042

Sun, Chih Che, Adam Hahn, and Chen Ching Liu. 2018. “Cyber Security of a Power Grid: State-of-the-Art.” International Journal of Electrical Power and Energy Systems. Elsevier Ltd. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijepes.2017.12.020

Tanay Kulkarni. 2022. “Cyber‐Physical Convergence in Critical Infrastructure Security: A Comparative Review of Cybersecurity Strategies in the Water and Energy Sectors.” International Journal For Multidisciplinary Research 4 (3). https://doi.org/10.36948/ijfmr.2022.v04i03.37530

Tatipatri, Naveen, and S. L. Arun. 2024. “A Comprehensive Review on Cyber-Attacks in Power Systems: Impact Analysis, Detection, and Cyber Security.” IEEE Access 12:18147–67. https://doi.org/10.1109/ACCESS.2024.3361039

Vance, Taylor Rodriguez, and Andrew Vance. 2019. “Cybersecurity in the Blockchain Era: A Survey on Examining Critical Infrastructure Protection with Blockchain-Based Technology.” In 2019 IEEE International Scientific-Practical Conference: Problems of Infocommunications Science and Technology, PIC S and T 2019 - Proceedings, 107–12. Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Inc. https://doi.org/10.1109/PICST47496.2019.9061242

Venkatachary, Sampath Kumar, Annamalai Alagappan, and Leo John Baptist Andrews. 2021. “Cybersecurity Challenges in Energy Sector (Virtual Power Plants) - Can Edge Computing Principles Be Applied to Enhance Security?” Energy Informatics 4 (1). https://doi.org/10.1186/s42162-021-00139-7

Venkatachary, Sampath Kumar, Jagdish Prasad, and Ravi Samikannu. 2018. “Cybersecurity and Cyber Terrorism - in Energy Sector – a Review.” Journal of Cyber Security Technology 2 (3–4): 111–30. https://doi.org/10.1080/23742917.2018.1518057

Vernotte, Alexandre, Margus Välja, Matus Korman, Gunnar Björkman, Mathias Ekstedt, and Robert Lagerström. 2018. “Load Balancing of Renewable Energy: A Cyber Security Analysis.” Energy Informatics 1 (1). https://doi.org/10.1186/s42162-018-0010-x.

Zhang, Hang, Bo Liu, and Hongyu Wu. 2021. “Smart Grid Cyber-Physical Attack and Defense: A Review.” IEEE Access. Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Inc. https://doi.org/10.1109/ACCESS.2021.3058628