Distributed Ledger Verification for Industrial Cyber-Attack Detection
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current methods fail to adequately detect and address cyber-attacks in industrial control systems, particularly at the domain layer where sensors, controllers, and actuators are located, leading to potential system shutdowns or catastrophic damage, as existing approaches are not designed to automatically detect stealthy attacks or multiple simultaneous attacks.
Innovation Solution
A verification platform using a secure, distributed ledger to store and verify industrial asset cyber-attack detection algorithm data by marking it as invalid initially and then validating it using a transaction identifier, ensuring the recorded hash value matches an independently created version, thereby protecting the system from false data manipulation.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Productivity
If a centralized database architecture is used to store and verify industrial data, then data verification can be performed efficiently, but the system becomes vulnerable to single points of failure and data manipulation
Solution Approach 1:
The patent divides the centralized database into multiple distributed nodes across a network. Each node maintains a copy of the ledger, eliminating the single point of failure. The segmentation is achieved through creating multiple independent verification nodes that collectively perform the data verification function, thereby maintaining efficiency while improving reliability through distribution.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces cryptographic hash functions and digital signatures as intermediaries between data producers and verifiers. These mathematical intermediaries enable trusted verification without requiring direct trust between system participants, allowing efficient verification while maintaining security through cryptographic proof mechanisms.
2Measurement precision
If multiple monitoring nodes are deployed to detect stealthy attacks, then detection accuracy improves, but system complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent merges the functions of multiple monitoring nodes into a unified distributed ledger system. Instead of managing separate complex monitoring systems, the patent combines their verification capabilities into a shared ledger that automatically coordinates detection across all nodes, improving accuracy while reducing overall system complexity through functional integration.
Solution Approach 2:
The distributed ledger serves multiple functions simultaneously: it stores industrial data, verifies data integrity, detects cyber-attacks, and provides an immutable audit trail. This multi-functionality eliminates the need for separate specialized systems for each function, reducing complexity while maintaining high detection accuracy through the universal verification mechanism.
3Reliability
If real-time verification of all industrial data is performed, then data integrity is ensured, but processing time and computational resources increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts only the essential verification information (cryptographic hashes and digital signatures) from the full data set and stores these compact representations in the distributed ledger. The actual industrial data remains outside the ledger, and only the extracted verification elements are subjected to real-time verification, maintaining data integrity while minimizing processing time and computational overhead.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent performs preliminary cryptographic hashing and digital signature generation at the data source before data enters the verification system. This preliminary action prepares the data for rapid verification by pre-computing the verification elements, allowing the distributed ledger to perform only simple hash comparison operations in real-time, thereby ensuring integrity without excessive processing delays.
Data Source
AI summary
A verification platform may include a data connection to receive a stream of industrial asset cyber-attack detection algorithm data, including a subset of the industrial asset cyber-attack detection algorithm data. The verification platform may store the subset into a data store (the subset of industrial asset cyber-attack detection algorithm data being marked as invalid) and record a hash value associated with a compressed representation of the subset of industrial asset cyber-attack detection algorithm data combined with metadata in a secure, distributed ledger. The verification platform may then receive a transaction identifier from the secure, distributed ledger and mark the subset of industrial asset cyber-attack detection algorithm data in the data store as being valid after using the transaction identifier to verify that the recorded hash value matches a hash value of an independently created version of the compressed representation of the subset of industrial asset cyber-attack detection algorithm data combined with metadata.