Electrical Power System's Shield against complex incidents and extensive cyber and privacy attacks

The challenge

Provide a cyber-shield armour to European EPES to survive coordinated, large scale cybersecurity and privacy incidents; guarantee the continuity of operations and minimize cascading effects in the infrastructure itself, the environment and the end-users at reasonable cost.

Project objectives

• Strengthen EPES cybersecurity preparedness
• Coordinate cyber-incident discovery, sharing & response
• Accelerate research & innovation in EPES cybersecurity via DevSecOps and innovative ML-based technologies.

Concept and approach

PHOENIX focuses on the protection of the European EPES via: (i) Cybersecurity & Data Privacy by design and by innovation, (ii) cross-country Cybersecurity Information Sharing, realising NIS Directive (iii) realistic exploitation, penetration testing and verification/certification methodologies and procedures and (iv) validation in 5 real-life Large Scale Pilots (LSP) across Europe.

Expected results

A holistic EPES security & privacy protection framework, including: (i)  5G/ inter-DLT secure & traceable communications, (ii) Situation Awareness, Perception & Comprehension based on privacy-preserving federated ML/zero knowledge verification, (iii) traceable/near real-time synchronized incidents information sharing platform (I2SP), (iv) GDPR Privacy Protection Toolkit, (v) innovative Security & Privacy as a service business model (vi) Certification methodology and procedures (targeting TRL 7-8)

Target end users

EPES Management Teams/Owners, Utilities, CERTs and National Security Organizations, ICT & security technology providers, institutional agencies for Civil Protection, EU and National-wide policy makers and regulatory bodies.

Main project events

Participation/Coordination at the European Technology and Innovation Platform for Smart Networks for Energy Transition (ETIP SNET), BRIDGE events/workshops, ECSO (European Cyber Security Organisation) and European Big Data Value Association (BDVA), Organizing at least 2 main demo-days at pilot sites.

EU policies

PHOENIX aligns to the Directive on European Critical Infrastructure (ECI) on the energy sector, eth basic arrangements for information exchange against risks and threats and the NIS Directive.  The PHOENIX joint Cybersecurity Certification Centre will support EPES systems and assets cybersecurity, privacy and interoperability certification methodologies.