Firewall for Attribute-Based Access Control in Smart Grids

This paper sets the focus on Attribute-based Access Control (ABAC) in Smart Grid environments such as substation automation scenarios. IEC 62351-8 describes Role-based Access Control (RBAC) and gives general guidance, but does not specify details. The development is often application specific, and typical challenges are legacy devices that cannot be updated to support additional features such as certain security services. This contribution describes the development of a firewall that implements Attribute-based Access Control based on XACML to protect end systems from unauthorized access and commands It includes the description and implementation of common attribute-based access control policies and the description a system to distribute attributes. Finally, the paper demonstrates performance evaluation results for selected architectures and scenarios.