Determining Asset Criticality in Cyber-Physical Smart Grid

Cybersecurity threats in smart grids have incredibly increased in the past years, and there is a strong need to protect these critical systems. Moreover, cyber-risk assessment and determining asset criticality are needed to apply the best remediation plan if the system is compromised. Still, due to the heterogeneity between operation technology (OT) and information technology, it is not easy to protect such a system altogether. Hence, the criticality of OT resources should be identified by their characteristics, helping operators understand that different assets can cause additional damage and require further protection or need more vital remediation plans. In this work, we proposed a methodology that can identify and indicates the frequency and impact of an asset in the system to determine its criticality. Moreover, the effectiveness and feasibility of the proposed method are evaluated by a 12-bus power system using the PowerWorld simulator by performing attacks on critical assets such as circuit breakers and evaluated their impact on the physical system. Finally, the test results demonstrate that targeting the most critical assets identified can severely impact the system while targeting the least critical assets is manageable.