Wireless Challenges in Meeting Critical Infrastructure Protection (CIP) Standards

North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) has promulgated Critical Infrastructure Protection (CIP) standards for cyber security in electric power industry. A recent white paper in Automation World magazine brings out challenges faced in CIP implementation due to proliferation of wireless networking. The paper lays out various scenarios such as approved wireless use, inadvertent wireless use, covert wireless use etc. which break conventional perimeter security model. It recommends state of the art wireless monitoring and control to enforce wireless perimeter security for energy assets.

This industry can benefit from Wireless Intrusion Prevention System (WIPS) to solve the problem of wireless monitoring and control on their sites. WIPS can facilitate
• enforcing authorized WiFi usage policy
• preventing inadvertent wireless use such as wired/wireless bridging clients and other wireless client misbehaviors
• preventing covert use of wireless such as rogue APs.

The white paper “Wireless System Considerations When Implementing NERC Critical Infrastructure Protection Standards,” can be downloaded at www.automationworld.com/whitepaper-5312. Another column related to wireless in CIP can found at www.automationworld.com/feature-5378. More information on WIPS can be found at www.airtightnetworks.com/home/solutions/wireless-intrusion-prevention.html and www.airtightnetworks.com/home/products/spectraguard-enterprise.html.

Overall, though the above white paper focuses on electric power industry, similar considerations also apply to other industries whose functioning is critical for normalcy of life, such as banking, transportation, government and others.

Hemant Chaskar Compliance, Wireless security CIP, Critical Infrastructure, NERC