Blockchain-Based Man-in-the-Middle (MITM) Attack Detection for Photovoltaic Systems

Conference · Mon Sep 06 00:00:00 EDT 2021 · 2021 IEEE Design Methodologies Conference (DMC)

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1109/dmc51747.2021.9529949· OSTI ID:2344947

Choi, Jinchun ^[1]; Ahn, Bohyun ^[2]; Bere, Gomanth ^[2]; Ahmad, Seerin ^[2]; Mantooth, Homer Alan ^[3]; Kim, Taesic ^[2]

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1. Texas A&M University-Kingsville, TX (United States); Texas A&M University-Kingsville
2. Texas A&M University-Kingsville, TX (United States)
3. University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, AR (United States)

Cybersecurity of photovoltaic (PV) systems entails a much larger scope than just encryption and firewall of communications. For instance, integrity of data in transit between inverters and a cloud server can be compromised by authorized third-party, devices, and internal network within security perimeter (i.e., man-in-the-middle (MITM) attack). To address this challenge, this paper proposes a blockchain-based MITM attack detection method for a PV system. A breakthrough method includes screening network data, network intrusion detection, and hash comparison of in-transit data using distributed ledgers. Furthermore, the proposed method is implemented in Internet-of-Thing (IoT) security modules as clients of a blockchain network and validated by experiments.

• Research Organization: University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, AR (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE), Renewable Power Office. Solar Energy Technologies Office
• DOE Contract Number: EE0009026
• OSTI ID: 2344947
• Journal Information: 2021 IEEE Design Methodologies Conference (DMC), Journal Name: 2021 IEEE Design Methodologies Conference (DMC)
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

blockchain
cybersecurity
man-in-the-middle attack
photovoltaic system
security module