Cybersecurity
Partnerships and Product Development
SEL partners with utilities, national laboratories, and networking and cybersecurity companies across the United States to identify, design, test, and bring to market new solutions for protecting critical infrastructure from cyber attacks.
Current Partnerships
Converged Industrial Edge
This U.S. Department of Energy CEDS partnership known as the Ambassador Project developed security orchestration for the SEL software-defined networking (SDN) flow controller, creating a single integrated management ecosystem for IT, operational technology (OT), and intrusion detection systems. It secures the OT and IT information exchange, reducing cybersecurity risks, lowering operational expenses, and enhancing situational awareness for utility providers and industrial operations.
Partners: Juniper Networks, Dragos, Inc.
SEL and Dragos Detect and Respond to Cyber Threats
SEL and Dragos, Inc., have designed an innovative solution that combines products from both companies to provide frontline monitoring and defense against cyber attacks aimed at industrial control systems.
Products Developed Via CEDS Cybersecurity Partnerships
As a participant in the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Innovation for Increasing Cybersecurity for Energy Delivery Systems (CEDS) program, our cybersecurity and product development teams and their project partners have brought several improved cybersecurity solutions to market.
The solutions we have developed through the CEDS program are integrated in several SEL products.
Lemnos Interoperability Security Project
The interoperability framework that resulted from this project is commercially available in the SEL-3620 Ethernet Security Gateway.
This framework uses widely available security functions and protocols, such as IPsec (to form a secure communications channel) and Syslog (to exchange security log messages). Using this model, security appliances from two or more different vendors can clearly and securely exchange information, helping to better protect the entire system.
Partners: EnerNex, Tennessee Valley Authority, Sandia National Laboratories
SDN Project
The technology developed in this project is commercially available as the SEL SDN product suite.
The world’s first control system-focused SDN flow controller allows utilities and industries to centrally manage their LANs more securely, providing real-time awareness of cyber activity and rerouting network traffic in response to cyber intrusions.
Partners: Ameren, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory
Exe-GUARD Whitelist Antivirus for Control Systems Project
Exe-GUARD is commercially available in the SEL-3610 Port Server, SEL-3620 Ethernet Security Gateway, and SEL-3622 Security Gateway.
This whitelist antivirus solution for control systems establishes a security baseline and automatically searches for and denies deviations from that baseline. Exe-GUARD can be integrated with substation-hardened computers and communications processors, minimizing the need for frequent decommissioning, security patches, and signature updates.
Partners: Dominion Virginia Power, Sandia National Laboratories
Padlock Project
The padlock technology is commercially available as an integrated feature in the SEL-3622 Security Gateway.
This project involved developing a low-power, small-sized dongle (or plug-in device) that provides strong authentication, logging, alarming, and secure communications for IEDs in the field operating at the distribution level.
Partners: Tennessee Valley Authority, Sandia National Laboratories