Towards characterization of cyber attacks on industrial control systems: Emulating field devices using Gumstix technology

Industrial control systems (ICS) have an inherent lack of security and situational awareness capabilities at the field device level. Yet these systems comprise a significant portion of the nation´s critical infrastructure. Currently, there is little insight into the characterization of attacks on ICS. Stuxnet provided an initial look at the type of tactics that can be employed to create physical damage via cyber means. The question still remains, however, as to the extent of malware and attacks that are targeting the critical infrastructure, along with the various methods employed to target systems associated with the ICS environment. This paper presents a device using Gumstix technology that emulates an ICS field device. The emulation device is low-cost, adaptable to myriad ICS environments and provides logging capabilities at the field device level. The device was evaluated to ensure conformity to RFC standards and that the operating characteristics are consistent with actual field devices.