Power Grid
Vulnerability of the Nation’s Power Grid
Mark Shelton
San Diego State University
PA571
November 18, 2014
Vulnerability of the Nation’s Power Grid
There are some issues that United States governments (both state and federal) take more seriously than the others. Security matters are always given priority in the United States of America because there are many disgruntled parties who would like to see the sovereignty and unity of this nation go down the drain. The most recent security concern being talked about is cyber security. This is because since the development of the internet the world has become prone to a new kind of danger; cyber terrorism. Information technology has brought many positive things. We can now communicate with each other on a global scale. Business meetings no longer have to be in the same room to be face to face. There is a whole new social existence online. And new developments are happening constantly.
But with all the good that comes from information technology there is also bad. The internet has also become a gateway for hackers to wreak havoc. In a nutshell, cyber-crime has become a headache in the 21st century because one individual can remotely attack any online system from any corner of the world crippling many economic developments. Even before the federal government can come up with effective ways of protecting its citizen from cyber-crime vulnerability, a new problem which can bring about devastating effects of equal measure has emerged. One such problem is the vulnerability of the nation’s power grid. The government had turned all of its attention to measures of countering cyber terrorism to an extent that it forgot that physical attacks on sources of power, which run these systems, could also bring equally devastating effects (Besanger et al 2013).
The vulnerability of the power grid system in the United States came to attract attention after a couple of unknown gunmen attacked a substation in April 2013 in California,
Mark Shelton
San Diego State University
PA571
November 18, 2014
Vulnerability of the Nation’s Power Grid
There are some issues that United States governments (both state and federal) take more seriously than the others. Security matters are always given priority in the United States of America because there are many disgruntled parties who would like to see the sovereignty and unity of this nation go down the drain. The most recent security concern being talked about is cyber security. This is because since the development of the internet the world has become prone to a new kind of danger; cyber terrorism. Information technology has brought many positive things. We can now communicate with each other on a global scale. Business meetings no longer have to be in the same room to be face to face. There is a whole new social existence online. And new developments are happening constantly.
But with all the good that comes from information technology there is also bad. The internet has also become a gateway for hackers to wreak havoc. In a nutshell, cyber-crime has become a headache in the 21st century because one individual can remotely attack any online system from any corner of the world crippling many economic developments. Even before the federal government can come up with effective ways of protecting its citizen from cyber-crime vulnerability, a new problem which can bring about devastating effects of equal measure has emerged. One such problem is the vulnerability of the nation’s power grid. The government had turned all of its attention to measures of countering cyber terrorism to an extent that it forgot that physical attacks on sources of power, which run these systems, could also bring equally devastating effects (Besanger et al 2013).
The vulnerability of the power grid system in the United States came to attract attention after a couple of unknown gunmen attacked a substation in April 2013 in California,
References: Vugrin, E. D., & Turgeon, J. D. (January 01, 2013). Advancing Cyber Resilience Analysis with Performance-Based Metrics from Infrastructure Assessments. International Journal of Secure Software Engineering (ijsse), 4, 1, 75-96. Besanger, Y., Eremia, M., & Voropai, N. (January 01, 2013). Major Grid Blackouts: Analysis, Classification, and Prevention. 789-863. Chen, P.-Y., Cheng, S.-M., & Chen, K.-C. (2012). Smart Attacks in Smart Grid Communication Networks. IEEE Communications Magazine, 50(8), 24-29. Schnurr, A. (January 01, 2013). Vulnerability of National Power Grids to Electromagnetic Threats: Domestic and International Perspectives. Energy Law Journal, 34, 1, 1-54. Marris, E. (2008). Energy: Upgrading the grid. Nature, 454(7204), 570-573. Smith, R. (2014, March 12). U.S. Risks National Blackout From Small-Scale Attack. Retrieved from The Wall Street Journal: http://online.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052702304020104579433670284061220 Think Grid. (2014, September 30). Shielding the substation against cyber-attacks. Retrieved from Think Grid: http://think-grid.org/shielding-substation-against-cyber-attacks