2018 International Conference on Power System Technology (POWERCON 2018) Guangzhou, 6-8 Nov. 2018
POWERCON2018 Paper No xxx Page1/7
An Experimental Research on Impacts of
Malicious Attacks on PMU in Smart Grids
Y. Yang
1,2
, Member, IEEE, J. Q. Ju
2
, Q. H. Li
3
, and Q. Wang
2
(1. State Grid Jiangsu Electric Power Research Institute, Nanjing, China;
2. Nanjing Normal University, Electrical engineering and automation institute, Nanjing, China;
3. Hz Leds Co., Ltd, Nanjing, China)
Abstract—Phasor measurement units (PMUs) has
been playing a significant role in current and next
generation synchrophasor systems in smart grids.
However, the PMU lacking security design
consideration also brings a number of potential
vulnerabilities and cyber threats from malicious
attackers, which may cause false situational awareness.
In this paper, an experimental research has been
carried out that demonstrates the impacts of malicious
attacks on the PMUs in smart grids. The topology of
simulated attack environment is proposed and the
physical test-bed with network attack environment is
set up including the mainstream PMUs. The
cyber-attack tests are taken such as communication
deception and global position system (GPS) signal
interference. The results of experimental research have
exposed the vulnerabilities and problems of PMU in the
face of malicious attacks, and provided the research
foundation for further cybersecurity defense for wide
are measurement system (WAMS) in smart grids.
Index Terms—PMU, cybersecurity, malicious attacks,
vulnerability, WAMS, smart grid.
I. INTRODUCTION
IPICAL supervisory control and data
acquisition (SCADA) systems are
insufficient in guaranteeing real-time cybersecurity
protection of power systems [1]. The technology of
wide area measurement system (WAMS) enables
near real-time monitoring of the system utilizing the
phasor measurement units (PMUs). Hence, data from
PMUs can support the efficient functioning of
critical power applications such as real-time
Manuscript received August 1, 2018. This work was supported in
part by National Natural Science Foundation of China under Grant
61602251 and the Project of State Grid Corporation of China (the
Identification Method of Malicious Attack on the Power Grid and
Active Defense Method on the Power Grid Side).
Yi Yang is with the State Grid Jiangsu Electric Power
Company Research Institute, Nanjing, 211103 China (e-mail:
yang_yi_ee@163.com).
Jiaqi Ju and Qi Wang are with the school of Electrical
engineering and automation, Nanjing Normal University, Nanjing,
China (Jiaqi Ju is the corresponding author, e-mail:
2685896209@qq.com)
Qiuhua Li is with the Hz Leds Co., Ltd, Nanjing, China
monitoring, advanced protection, and dynamic
control [2], [3].
The accuracy can also be greatly improved for
various power system applications such as state
estimation, disturbance monitoring, instability
prediction, and wide area protection [4], [5]. PMU
data is so attractive that it has been the target of
malicious attackers who aim to cause widespread
grid damage, considering the time-sensitive and
critical nature of the measurements [6], [7].
Currently, many researchers have done a lot of
research on information security of power systems.
In [8], a security-oriented cyber-physical state
estimation system is proposed to identify the
maliciously modified measurement using a
combined bad-data detection method which is based
on power measurement and state estimation results.
However, this work is only for specific systems.
Mousavian et al. [9] presented a probabilistic risk
mitigation model for cyber-attacks against PMU
networks, and a mixed integer linear programming
(MILP) is formulated that incorporates the derived
threat levels of PMUs into a risk-mitigation
technique in this model. However, the estimation
problem with PMUs is not considered—the relation
between real-time state and threat level of power
system is neglected. A risk mitigation strategy is
proposed to guarantee the elimination of threats from
attacks in [10], however, the premise of the strategy
is that the potentially incomplete knowledge of
power system models and parameters are known.
Some researchers have proposed PMU defense
against different attacks [11-14]. Some researchers
have studied the effects of incorrect data and joint
attacks on information physics systems [15], [16].
II. BACKGROUND
A. Basic principle of PMU
The basic principle of the PMU is as follows: The
global positioning system (GPS) receiver emits 1pps