Attacks on the Siemens S7 Protocol Using an Industrial Control System Testbed

The stability of critical infrastructure depends on a secure energy supply, highlighting the need for robust cybersecurity in Smart Grids (SGs) as they increasingly integrate renewable energy sources.Unlike traditional power plants, modern renewable facilities are distributed and rely on remote control, broadening the attack surface and requiring enhanced resilience against cyber threats to ensure availability.Testing cyberattacks on physical power plants poses risks of outages and financial losses.To address this, we developed a Hardware-in-the-Loop (HIL) testbed simulating three renewable energy plants, offering a safe, adaptable, and cost-effective platform for analyzing cyberattack impacts.Our novel testbed architecture enables simulation of unsafe states under cyberattack scenarios.We advance the field by demonstrating an attack using a S7 data modification technique, rarely explored in previous research.Additionally, we contribute a comprehensive dataset for SG cybersecurity, using it to create a baseline Machine Learning (ML) based Intrusion Detection System (IDS).