Data Exfiltration through Electromagnetic Covert Channel of Wired Industrial Control Systems
Industrial control systems (ICS) often contain sensitive information related to the corresponding equipment being controlled and their configurations. Protecting such information is important to both the manufacturers and users of such ICSs. This work demonstrates an attack vector on industrial cont...
| Main Authors: | , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
MDPI AG
2023-02-01
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| Series: | Applied Sciences |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://www.mdpi.com/2076-3417/13/5/2928 |
| _version_ | 1827753065908797440 |
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| author | Shakthi Sachintha Nhien-An Le-Khac Mark Scanlon Asanka P. Sayakkara |
| author_facet | Shakthi Sachintha Nhien-An Le-Khac Mark Scanlon Asanka P. Sayakkara |
| author_sort | Shakthi Sachintha |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Industrial control systems (ICS) often contain sensitive information related to the corresponding equipment being controlled and their configurations. Protecting such information is important to both the manufacturers and users of such ICSs. This work demonstrates an attack vector on industrial control systems where information can be exfiltrated through a electromagnetic (EM) radiation covert channel from the wired Ethernet connections commonly used by these devices. The attack leverages compromised firmware for the controller—capable of encoding sensitive/critical information into the wired network as packet transmission patterns. The EM radiation from the wired network’s communication is captured without direct physical interaction using a portable software-defined radio, and subsequently demodulated on the attacker’s computer. This covert channel facilitates the exfiltration of data from a distance of up to two metres with a data rate of 10 bps without any significant data loss. The nature of this covert channel demonstrates that having strong firewalls and network security. |
| first_indexed | 2024-03-11T07:31:50Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-684ed1c275814592b18b51232ed840ec |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2076-3417 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-03-11T07:31:50Z |
| publishDate | 2023-02-01 |
| publisher | MDPI AG |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Applied Sciences |
| spelling | doaj.art-684ed1c275814592b18b51232ed840ec2023-11-17T07:16:58ZengMDPI AGApplied Sciences2076-34172023-02-01135292810.3390/app13052928Data Exfiltration through Electromagnetic Covert Channel of Wired Industrial Control SystemsShakthi Sachintha0Nhien-An Le-Khac1Mark Scanlon2Asanka P. Sayakkara3University of Colombo School of Computing (UCSC), Colombo 7, Sri LankaForensics and Security Research Group, School of Computer Science, University College Dublin, Belfield, 4 Dublin, IrelandForensics and Security Research Group, School of Computer Science, University College Dublin, Belfield, 4 Dublin, IrelandUniversity of Colombo School of Computing (UCSC), Colombo 7, Sri LankaIndustrial control systems (ICS) often contain sensitive information related to the corresponding equipment being controlled and their configurations. Protecting such information is important to both the manufacturers and users of such ICSs. This work demonstrates an attack vector on industrial control systems where information can be exfiltrated through a electromagnetic (EM) radiation covert channel from the wired Ethernet connections commonly used by these devices. The attack leverages compromised firmware for the controller—capable of encoding sensitive/critical information into the wired network as packet transmission patterns. The EM radiation from the wired network’s communication is captured without direct physical interaction using a portable software-defined radio, and subsequently demodulated on the attacker’s computer. This covert channel facilitates the exfiltration of data from a distance of up to two metres with a data rate of 10 bps without any significant data loss. The nature of this covert channel demonstrates that having strong firewalls and network security.https://www.mdpi.com/2076-3417/13/5/2928covert channelEM radiationexfiltrationair-gapEthernetsoftware-defined-radio |
| spellingShingle | Shakthi Sachintha Nhien-An Le-Khac Mark Scanlon Asanka P. Sayakkara Data Exfiltration through Electromagnetic Covert Channel of Wired Industrial Control Systems Applied Sciences covert channel EM radiation exfiltration air-gap Ethernet software-defined-radio |
| title | Data Exfiltration through Electromagnetic Covert Channel of Wired Industrial Control Systems |
| title_full | Data Exfiltration through Electromagnetic Covert Channel of Wired Industrial Control Systems |
| title_fullStr | Data Exfiltration through Electromagnetic Covert Channel of Wired Industrial Control Systems |
| title_full_unstemmed | Data Exfiltration through Electromagnetic Covert Channel of Wired Industrial Control Systems |
| title_short | Data Exfiltration through Electromagnetic Covert Channel of Wired Industrial Control Systems |
| title_sort | data exfiltration through electromagnetic covert channel of wired industrial control systems |
| topic | covert channel EM radiation exfiltration air-gap Ethernet software-defined-radio |
| url | https://www.mdpi.com/2076-3417/13/5/2928 |
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