Time-Sensitive Networking to Improve the Performance of Distributed Functional Safety Systems Implemented over Wi-Fi

Industry 4.0 has significantly improved the industrial manufacturing scenario in recent years. The Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) enables the creation of globally interconnected smart factories, where constituent elements seamlessly exchange information. Industry 5.0 has further complemented these achievements, as it focuses on a human-centric approach where humans become part of this network of things, leading to a robust human–machine interaction. In this distributed, dynamic, and highly interconnected environment, functional safety is essential for adequately protecting people and machinery. The increasing availability of wireless networks makes it possible to implement distributed and flexible functional safety systems. However, such networks are known for introducing unwanted delays that can lead to safety performance degradation due to their inherent uncertainty. In this context, the Time-Sensitive Networking (TSN) standards present an attractive prospect for enhancing and ensuring acceptable behaviors. The research presented in this paper deals with the introduction of TSN to implement functional safety protocols for wireless networks. Among the available solutions, we selected Wi-Fi since it is a widespread network, often considered and deployed for industrial applications. The introduction of a reference functional safety protocol is detailed, along with an analysis of how TSN can enhance its behavior by evaluating relevant performance indexes. The evaluation pertains to a standard case study of an industrial warehouse, tested through practical simulations. The results demonstrate that TSN provides notable advantages, but it requires meticulous coordination with the Wi-Fi MAC layer protocol to guarantee improved performance

Enhancing security in ROS

In recent years, we observed a growth of cybersecurity threats, especially due to the ubiquitous of connected and autonomous devices commonly defined as Internet of Things (IoT). These devices, designed to handle basic operations, commonly lacks security measurements. In this paper we want to tackle how we could, by design, apply static and dynamic security solutions for those devices and define security measurements without degrading overall the performance

Software Defined Networking Opportunities for Intelligent Security Enhancement of Industrial Control Systems

In the last years, cyber security of Industrial Control Systems (ICSs) has become an important issue due to the discovery of sophisticated malware that by attacking Critical Infrastructures, could cause catastrophic safety results. Researches have been developing countermeasures to enhance cyber security for pre-Internet era systems, which are extremely vulnerable to threats. This paper presents the potential opportunities that Software Defined Networking (SDN) provides for the security enhancement of Industrial Control Networks. SDN permits a high level of configuration of a network by the separation of control and data planes. In this work, we describe the affinities between SDN and ICSs and we discuss about implementation strategies

An optimized firewall anomaly resolution

Firewalls are the key mechanism in cybersecurity, that has been widely used to ensure network security. In literature, several works have been proposed in the area of firewall rules managing, however, the correct firewall configuration still remains a complex and error-prone task. Anomalies among firewall rules can cause severe network breaches, such as allowing harmful packets to slip into a subnetwork or dropping legitimate traffic which in turn could hinder the correct availability of web services. This paper aims to help the network security administrators by introducing a formal approach that reduces the number of anomalies in firewalls’ configurations that the administrators are usually obligated to manually solve

Evaluating the Integration of Wireless Time-Sensitive Networking with Software-Defined Networking for Dynamic Network Configuration

The introduction of Time-Sensitive Networking (TSN) is revolutionizing real-time networks and time-critical applications. Recent advancements in this field extended the TSN capabilities to wireless technologies, giving rise to the concept of wireless TSN (WTSN). This paper focuses on the integration of wireless TSN with Software-Defined Networking (SDN) to enable dynamic network configuration and improve the performance of time-sensitive applications. We present a practical test environment that uses a hybrid network configuration consisting of wireless and wired TSN links. The primary objective is to evaluate the effectiveness of combining a TSN-capable network with an SDN controller. This setup enables dynamic configuration and routing within the system, allowing for prompt actions to address network issues, such as seamlessly re-routing data paths between the two links due to an increase in latency or packet loss. A measurement setup using OpenVSwitch in the wireless TSN domain is presented, along with the evaluation of time synchronization and dynamic route selection capabilities

SROS1: Using and Developing Secure ROS1 Systems

SROS1 is a proposed addition to the ROS1 API and ecosystem to support modern cryptography and security measures. An overview of current progress will be presented, explaining each major advancement, including: over-the-wire cryptography for all data transport, namespaced access control enforcing graph policies/restrictions, and finally process profiles using Linux Security Modules to harden a node's resource access. This chapter not only seeks to raise community awareness of the vulnerabilities in ROS1, but to provide clear instruction along designed patterns of development for using proposed solutions provided by SROS1 to advance the state of security for open source robotics subsystems