Coordinated Defense of Distributed Denial of Service Attacks against the Multi-Area Load Frequency Control Services

• Main Authors: Qi Wang, Wei Tai, Yi Tang, Hong Zhu, Ming Zhang, Dongxu Zhou
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 2019-06-01
• Series: Energies
• Subjects: distributed denial of service; co-simulation platform; load frequency control; coordinated defense
• Online Access: https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/12/13/2493

With the application of information and communication technology (ICT), the modern power system has gradually been updated to a typical cyber physical power system (CPPS). The deployment of distributed measurement devices enriches the application range of power communication services. However, due to the easy accessibility of distributed devices, it also creates favorable conditions for distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks. In this paper, we focus on the security performance and defense strategies of the CPPS against DDoS attacks. In order to construct a coordinated defense in the power and information space, the cyber-attack process with a complete data flow of the CPPS needs to be described precisely. Therefore, a co-simulation technology-based platform is utilized to coordinate various layers in the CPPS and provide a unified research tool for the attack-defense test. On this basis, OPNET is used to replicate DDoS attacks in the information layer. Then, through the load frequency control (LFC) service of a multi-area interconnected power system, the influence of delays resulting from attacks on the control effect of the power layer is analyzed. Finally, to cope with the attack effects in both layers, detection measures of information and recovery measures of power quality are coordinated to eliminate attack consequences. Therefore, the stable operation of power services can be enabled.