Stuxnet worm impact on industrial cyber-physical system security

Abstract

Industrial systems consider only partially security, mostly relying on the basis of “isolated” networks, and controlled access environments. Monitoring and control systems such as SCADA/DCS are responsible for managing critical infrastructures operate in these environments, where a false sense of security assumptions is usually made. The Stuxnet worm attack demonstrated widely in mid 2010 that many of the security assumptions made about the operating environment, technological capabilities and potential threat risk analysis are far away from the reality and challenges modern industrial systems face. We investigate in this work the highly sophisticated aspects of Stuxnet, the impact that it may have on existing security considerations and pose some thoughts on the next generation SCADA/DCS systems from a security perspective.