Blockchain-Based Firmware Security Check and Recovery for Smart Inverters

Abstract

The importance of cybersecurity for inverters has been significantly increasing as inverters become smarter by using advanced network and computing power from cyber systems. This paper explores potential attacks targeting firmware of smart inverters and how blockchain technology can be applied to mitigate the firmware modification attacks. A breakthrough method includes an automated firmware integrity check, an anomaly detection algorithm, and recovery creating patch using local distributed ledgers. The proposed method is implemented in Internet-of-Thing (IoT) security modules as clients of a blockchain network and validated by experiments. The proposed method is transformative to other networked power electronic devices.