A Logical Risk Assessment Schema for Industrial Control Systems

Information and cyber security has gained considerable importance as safety of the Industrial Control Systems (ICS). Both safety and security deal with risks. Risk assessment is an essential component of safety and security assurance infrastructure mechanisms. Considering the negative or uncertain influence on running ICS, the abstracted ICS model and simulation of ICS is introduced into safety-security risk assessment to form the logical risk assessment schema. Then a risk assessment process framework considering both safety and security is presented. The proposed framework consists of context establishment, overall safety-security risk assessment process, and verification. In the safety-security risk assessment process, conflicts of the risk treatments are addressed to form conflict-free safety-security risk treatment set. The proposed logical schema and risk assessment framework can be used to guide the safety-security risk assessment process of the industrial control systems and support the utilities and organizations in their safety-security efforts.