Exploiting virtual network for CPS security analysis. Secure Water Treatment simulation with MiniCPS and GNS3

Since the beginning of the century, Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS) started to be adopted by many fields, such as industry, medicine, driving, and even everyday life with the Internet Of Things. However, the widespread usage of CPS in a vastly different scenario led to a security issue. Furthermore, due to the nature of CPS (use cases, vast topologies, and cost of the systems), it is impossible to build testbeds and test systems in most cases. In this context, the thesis aims to use virtual network simulation tools to simu- late a precise kind of CPS: SCADA system. In particular, MiniCPS, a framework built on top of Mininet, and GNS3 have been used to simulate a water purification process called Secure Water Treatment. Some common attacks are performed, such as arp poisoning. How those attacks can cause physical damage in the water purification process is analyzed. Moreover, a worm, S.P.A.R.A, has been implemented to infect, study, and compromise the microcontroller of the Secure Water Treatment. Eventually, final consideration of the pros and cons encountered in using the two simulation tools has been given, with suggestions on possible future work.