Periodic Reporting for period 1 - CHRISS (Critical infrastructure High accuracy and Robustness increase Integrated Synchronization Solutions)
Periodo di rendicontazione: 2022-11-01 al 2024-04-30
Project Summary
Technologies based on the Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) are essential for critical infrastructure like telecommunication networks. New and emerging technologies like 5G and time division duplexing require highly accurate and secure timing distribution. Failure in this area can result in costly and potentially dangerous blackouts or malfunctioning of the telecommunication network. In this context, the EU-funded CHRISS project will develop approaches for detecting and mitigating radio interferences, jamming and spoofing attacks for the security of telecommunication networks. Specifically, a Galileo-based timing distribution and synchronisation solution will increase resilience to GNSS signals interference, jamming, spoofing and cyberattacks on the fibre-optics distribution layer.
Objective
"Critical infrastructure, such as telecommunications networks, requires GNSS based time reference to enable their proper functioning over a large area.
Especially emerging telecommunications applications such as 5G or Time Division Duplex require a highly accurate and secure timing distribution. Failure of the time distribution service can lead to failure of critical infrastructure, resulting in blackouts or failure of the telecommunications network with damages exceeding the billion € for whole economies as well as severe safety and security risks for the general public.
From the very nature of the GNSS systems, they are vulnerable to external, independent, and arbitrary radio interferences, jamming and spoofing. Consequently, the time synchronization may be interrupted or falsified, causing the real danger of time reference outage or alteration of the telecom network time reference. Therefore, finding approaches for detecting and mitigating radio interferences, jamming, and spoofing attacks is a critical issue for the security of telecom networks.
Moreover, critical infrastructure requires safety layers, ensuring protection and integrity in the communication between nodes and terminals in the network (e.g. time synchronisation at the base stations of the telecommunications networks). The emerging technology of blockchain-based verification, identification and coding has been proven multiple times to be the future of information exchange applications.
In the presented initiative, the ""Critical infrastructure High accuracy and Robustness increase Integrated Synchronization Solutions – CHRISS will demonstrate first on the market, an integrated into one device, Galileo based timing distribution and synchronization solution enabling increased resilience to GNSS signals interference, jamming, spoofing and cyber-attack on fiber-optics distribution layer resulting in increased time distribution service availability, accuracy and reliability."
Technologies based on the Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) are essential for critical infrastructure like telecommunication networks. New and emerging technologies like 5G and time division duplexing require highly accurate and secure timing distribution. Failure in this area can result in costly and potentially dangerous blackouts or malfunctioning of the telecommunication network. In this context, the EU-funded CHRISS project will develop approaches for detecting and mitigating radio interferences, jamming and spoofing attacks for the security of telecommunication networks. Specifically, a Galileo-based timing distribution and synchronisation solution will increase resilience to GNSS signals interference, jamming, spoofing and cyberattacks on the fibre-optics distribution layer.
Objective
"Critical infrastructure, such as telecommunications networks, requires GNSS based time reference to enable their proper functioning over a large area.
Especially emerging telecommunications applications such as 5G or Time Division Duplex require a highly accurate and secure timing distribution. Failure of the time distribution service can lead to failure of critical infrastructure, resulting in blackouts or failure of the telecommunications network with damages exceeding the billion € for whole economies as well as severe safety and security risks for the general public.
From the very nature of the GNSS systems, they are vulnerable to external, independent, and arbitrary radio interferences, jamming and spoofing. Consequently, the time synchronization may be interrupted or falsified, causing the real danger of time reference outage or alteration of the telecom network time reference. Therefore, finding approaches for detecting and mitigating radio interferences, jamming, and spoofing attacks is a critical issue for the security of telecom networks.
Moreover, critical infrastructure requires safety layers, ensuring protection and integrity in the communication between nodes and terminals in the network (e.g. time synchronisation at the base stations of the telecommunications networks). The emerging technology of blockchain-based verification, identification and coding has been proven multiple times to be the future of information exchange applications.
In the presented initiative, the ""Critical infrastructure High accuracy and Robustness increase Integrated Synchronization Solutions – CHRISS will demonstrate first on the market, an integrated into one device, Galileo based timing distribution and synchronization solution enabling increased resilience to GNSS signals interference, jamming, spoofing and cyber-attack on fiber-optics distribution layer resulting in increased time distribution service availability, accuracy and reliability."
Within the project, complex analyses were made on how the technical systems for the distribution of synchronization information are affected by potential jamming, spoofing, meaconing or cyber-attacks. Based on the analysis made, clear areas of vulnerability and ways to mitigate the associated risks were identified through clear countermeasures to be implemented. For GNSS reception systems, in addition to the complex digital processing of the received signal, which keeps the signal-to-noise ratio high, and the use of all available frequencies for the fusion of the receptive information, the OS-NMA authentication protocol will also be used. For the physical protection of the equipment, a recessed system will be implemented that determines through specific sensors a possible intrusion at the physical level of the equipment. Additional measures are applied to detect attempts to remotely access the equipment configuration menu by unauthorized users. For the transmission of synchronization information in PTP/WR format, immediate authentication methods are applied that prevent unauthorized users from taking control of the distribution of this protocol. The combination of all these protection methods significantly increases the degree of robustness in operation of the synchronization information distribution system.
The implementation of the project within communication networks will significantly contribute to increasing the degree of operational robustness of communication networks and other technical systems that are critically dependent on the accuracy of this information, such as electricity distribution systems and authentication mechanisms in interbank transactions. The system is being tested at prototype level and after the necessary adjustments will soon be commercially available. Putting it on the market will lead to a significant increase in the diversity of the offer in this critical area. From a regulatory point of view, systems of this type, which use blockchain algorithms to monitor the safe operation of technical systems, will need specific regulations and standardizations in the future to allow a wide adoption of this high-tech technical system. At this point the proposed system, including the multimodal security architecture based on blockchain algorithms, is original and requires further testing to be fully technologically confirmed.