A Survey of SCADA Testbed Implementation Approaches

Objectives: SCADA systems are turning into the central nerve system of the electric power system critical infrastructure. With the increasing availability and use of computer networks and the Internet as well as the convenience of cloud computing, SCADA systems have increasingly adopted Internet-of-Things technologies to significantly reduce infrastructure costs and increase ease of maintenance and integration. However, SCADA systems are obvious targets for cyber attacks that would seek to disrupt the critical infrastructure systems thus are governed by a SCADA system. Methods/Statistical Analysis: Cyber attacks exploit SCADA security vulnerabilities in order to take control or disrupt the normal operation of the system. Analyzing security vulnerability and loopholes are critical in developing security solutions for such systems. It is also equally important to test security solutions developed to protect SCADA systems. Findings: Experimenting on live systems is generally not advisable and impractical as this may render the system unstable. Such situation calls for the need of an experimental setup equivalent or quite close to the real scenario for developing and testing security solutions. Application/Improvements: This paper reviews common SCADA implementation approaches utilized in previous related works.