Cyber-Security Glossary of Building Hacks and Cyber-Attacks

Cyber Booby-Trap, Cybercasing, Cyber-Physical Attack, Bluesnarfing, Hi-Link, Aurora Vulnerability. What does it all mean? Buildings today are automated because the systems are complicated so we depend on the Building Controls System (BCS) to operate the equipment.  We also depend on a Computerized Maintenance Management System (CMMS) to keep a record of what was repaired and to schedule required maintenance. SCADA, BCS and CMMS can all be hacked. Maintenance staff may think the BCS is not connected to the Internet, but as a Registered Architect it’s been years since I’ve seen a building that is not connected to the Internet.  If your building is connected to the Internet, I assure you that your BCS has already been hacked and mapped, the data in the CMMS has been exfiltrated, and backdoors have been installed. And, if your BCS is also connected to your Enterprise network, hackers may have gotten into that thru the BCS. If hackers get into your BCS, they own you. Discussion of building hacks and cyber-attacks is clouded by a lack of standard definitions and a general misunderstanding about how bad actors can actually employ cyber technology as a weapon in the real world. Architects, engineers and facility engineers need to know how to defend their buildings against cyber-attack by learning more about the cyber “attack surface” which is the sum of all the “attack vectors”.  The Cyber-Security Glossary of Building Hacks and Cyber-Attacks was developed specifically to introduce non-IT Managers to the vulnerability of industrial control systems (and SCADA systems) to cyber-attack.   The book includes definitions of technical terms related to equipment controls common to industry, utilities and buildings and much of the terminology applies to cyber-attacks in general. I define many types of cyber-attacks including: Cyber Booby Traps; Dictionary attack; Cinderella attack; Time Bomb attack; Fork Bomb attack; Logic Bomb attack; Bluesnarfing; Smurf attack; Vampire Tap; Water Holing; Pass the Hash attack; Tiny Fragment attack; Protocol Fuzzing attack; Replay attack; Amplification attack; Man in the Middle attack; and many more. Look for the Kindle Edition In February 2016.