University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

TASC: Transparent, Agnostic, Secure Channel for CBTC under Failure or Cyberattack

Utku Tefek; Ertem Esiner; Lin Wei; Yih-Chun Hu

Permalink

https://hdl.handle.net/2142/114348

Description

Title
TASC: Transparent, Agnostic, Secure Channel for CBTC under Failure or Cyberattack
Author(s)
  • Utku Tefek
  • Ertem Esiner
  • Lin Wei
  • Yih-Chun Hu
Keyword(s)
Availability; CBTC; Communication redundancy; Jamming attack
Abstract
Modern railway systems rely on communication-based train control (CBTC) for traffic management and automation. CBTC provides the controller with precise, timely updates on the position/speed of trains and communicates the corresponding control information to the trains. However, disruptions due to potential component failures and jamming attacks threaten the communication availability in CBTC. To improve availability, we propose a countermeasure based on redundant communications. The proposed Transparent, Agnostic, Secure Communication (TASC) system sniffs and tunnels the CBTC messages through an alternative network to their intended receivers. Prior works mitigate the impact of jamming and failures through hardware modifications to CBTC. In contrast, TASC is transparent to the underlying system, causing no interference unless signaling is disrupted, and designed to be agnostic to communication protocols above the physical-layer. Unlike commonly adopted active redundancy via the duplication of components, TASC steps in only upon signaling disruptions, employing standby redundancy.
Publisher
Springer
Series/Report Name or Number
LNCS, volume 13294
Type of Resource
text
Language
en
Handle URL
https://hdl.handle.net/2142/114348
Permalink
https://hdl.handle.net/2142/114348

Owning Collections

Working Papers - Coordinated Science Laboratory PRIMARY
Working papers by Coordinated Science Laboratory researchers.