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Cyber security is big business today. Smart Grid is big business today. Therefore let’s put the
two together and write a book? Well, surely there will be some individuals that may make that
assumption as to the motivation behind the publication of this book. The real motivation behind
the development of this book is because this is a very real issue, and the failure to address the
cyber security risk within the Grid may have serious repercussions for every single one of us.
Our intention of course is not to use FUD (Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt) as the business case for
implementing cyber security measures to protect the Grid. However, there are potentially some
very alarming ramifications should such measures fail to be implemented. This was highlighted
with recent reports of stranded passengers on trains, traffic lights no longer working, and electric
crematoriums shutting down with half-burnt bodies–only a small subset of the implications following
recent power outages experienced at the end of July 2012 for almost 700 million Indian
citizens.1 This is of course refers to one of the world’s worst power blackouts, which affected 20
of the 28 Indian states. Almost three weeks after the failure of three of country’s five electricity
grids, the government provided a report to investigate the cause of the failure.
Many people think of the Smart Grid as a power distribution group built on advanced smart metering-but that's just one aspect of a much larger and more complex system. The "Smart Grid" requires new technologies throughout energy generation, transmission and distribution, and even the homes and businesses being served by the grid. This also represents new information paths between these new systems and services, all of which represents risk, requiring a more thorough approach to where and how cyber security controls are implemented.
This insight provides a detailed architecture of the entire Smart Grid, with recommended cyber security measures for everything from the supply chain to the consumer.
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Discover the potential of the Smart Grid
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Learn in depth about its systems
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See its vulnerabilities and how best to protect it
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