Cybersecurity capabilities for critical infrastructure resilience

Abstract

Purpose For many innovative organisations, Industry 4.0 paves the way for significant operational efficiencies, quality of goods and services and cost reductions. One of the ways to realise these benefits is to embark on digital transformation initiatives that may be summed up as the intelligent interconnectivity of people, processes, data and cyber-connected things. Sadly, this interconnectivity between the enterprise information technology (IT) and industrial control systems (ICS) environment introduces new attack surfaces for critical infrastructure (CI) operators. As a result of the ICS cybersecurity risk introduced by the interconnectivity between the enterprise IT and ICS networks, the purpose of this study is to identify the cybersecurity capabilities that CI operators must have to attain good cybersecurity resilience. Design/methodology/approach A scoping literature review of best practice international CI protection frameworks, standards and guidelines were conducted. Similar cybersecurity practices from these frameworks, standards and guidelines were grouped together under a corresponding National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) cybersecurity framework (CF) practice. Practices that could not be categorised under any of the existing NIST CF practices were considered new insights, and therefore, additions. Findings A CI cybersecurity capability framework comprising 29 capability domains (cybersecurity focus areas) was developed as an adaptation of the NIST CF with an added dimension. This added dimension emphasises cloud computing and internet of things (IoT) security. Each of the 29 cybersecurity capability domains is executed through various capabilities (cybersecurity processes and procedures). The study found that each cybersecurity capability can further be operationalised by a set of cybersecurity controls derived from various frameworks, standards and guidelines, such as COBIT®, CIS®, ISA/IEC 62443, ISO/IEC 27002 and NIST Special Publication 800-53. Practical implications CI sectors are immediately able to adopt the CI cybersecurity capability framework to evaluate their levels of resilience against cyber-attacks, given new attack surfaces introduced by the interconnectivity of cyber-connected things between the enterprise and ICS levels. Originality/value The authors present an added dimension to the NIST framework for CI cyber protection. In addition to emphasising cryptography, IoT and cloud computing security aspects, this added dimension highlights the need for an integrated approach to CI cybersecurity resilience instead of a piecemeal approach.

Cybersecurity in Digital Transformation applications: Analysis of Past Research and Future Directions

“…Further insight into the first group of articles revealed that five articles developed some interesting frameworks that could be used in different scenarios in cybersecurity. These frameworks are: the Industry 4.0 maturity framework (Castelo-Branco et al, 2022), the critical infrastructure cybersecurity capability framework (Malatji, Marnewick & Von Solms, 2022), the cyber risk management framework (Lee, 2021), the experimental cyberattack detection framework (Mironeanu et al, 2021) and the IoT enabled smart government framework (Chatfield & Reddick, 2019). In addition to these frameworks, two models were proposed: the realistic-decision support model (Rodrigues et al, 2022) and the SME cybersecurity assessment model (Emer, Unterhofer & Rauch, 2021), and a model for quantifying the information security of the power network (Yuan et al, 2022).…”

Interplay between cyber supply chain risk management practices and cyber security performance

“…Studies have attempted to dissect various aspects of CSCRM, such as risk management concepts (e.g., Gani & Fernando, 2018), visibility (e.g. Kalaiarasan et al, 2022) and achieving supply chain resiliency (e.g., Malatji et al, 2021). It has been argued that most have presented conceptual frameworks without empirical data (Cheung et al, 2021).…”

Industry 4.0 Solutions Impacts on Critical Infrastructure Safety and Protection–A Systematic Literature Review

“…ICS is considered by many authors to be the heart of critical infrastructure [124], [125] because it is mainly responsible for supervisory control and data collection (SCADA), process monitoring, and control of system information flows in the industry. The importance of cybersecurity in this context has been discussed in many papers [101], [103]- [105], [114], [126]. The cluster also includes studies on software-defined networking issues, which is an important element responsible for the security of data transmitted within the network [110] and can be a countermeasure for Address Resolution Protocol (ARP) spoofing in Communication-Based Train Control (CBTC) systems [127].…”

“…The initially identified clusters 2, 3, 4, and 6 (see Table V) were merged into FC2 (final cluster 2) as they all pertain to the same major thematic area: implementing Industry 4.0 technologies to support critical infrastructure. It should be noted that in some of the papers, the authors observed that the main technologies of Industry 4.0 support critical infrastructure [105], [108], but in other studies technologies such as CPSs [104], (I)IoT [103], [104], cloud computing [102], [126], blockchain [103] were considered important and inseparable elements of critical infrastructure as such. In some publications, the authors explore the integration of various I4.0 technologies in the context of CI, e.g.…”

“…refrigeration units in hospital buildings [131]. It also discusses cybersecurity capabilities that ensure the resilience of critical infrastructure [126], as well as the alignment of AI with disaster resilience management support systems [132]. An important aspect of resilience is indicated in the paper [104], which presents anomaly detection as an important category of ensuring for the security of energy CPS.…”