Now showing 1 - 10 of 95
  • Publication
    Automated Root Cause Analysis in Time-Sensitive Networks Based on Fault Models
    Time-Sensitive networking plays a major role in the convergence of IT and OT in the use cases of Industry 4.0. The available mechanisms of TSN, such as Frame Preemption (IEEE 802.1Q), Time Synchronization (IEEE 802.1AS), and Enhancements for Scheduled Traffic (IEEE 802.1Q), make devices and networks more complex when they first start up, run, or fail. Fault detection and diagnosis require experience and expert knowledge to find the root cause of faults and troubleshoot them. However, unlike other communication technologies, there is no information about possible faults or errors, how to recognize errors, or how to handle errors in time-sensitive mechanisms. Therefore, a fully automated approach to identifying the underlying cause of a malfunction is required to aid network administrators in the event of a malfunction, thereby minimizing downtime. How can an automated root cause analysis system in time-sensitive networking be realized, and how can faulty configuration of scheduled traffic be automatically detected? This work describes a concept for automated root cause analysis in time-sensitive networks based on fault models (SARCAI-TSN), and investigates the possible symptoms of faulty Frame Preemption and Scheduled Traffic configuration with a test setup. Furthermore, it presents a scheduled traffic anomaly detection algorithm for the detection of faulty scheduled traffic configurations. This research provides assistance to both vendors and users in fault detection and diagnosis (FDD) in Time-Sensitive Networking.
  • Publication
    Outdoor Field Test of 5G-based V2X Communication for Real-Time Monitoring and Remote Control of a Monorail Vehicle
    Smart cities will be significantly shaped by their modes of mobility. For the blend of public and individual transport, smart mobility will introduce autonomous vehicles on a large scale, which often heavily rely on communication. As the capabilities of autonomous vehicles are still limited nowadays, driver-less vehicles have to be able to be remotely monitored and controlled in real-time. This creates high performance demands for the vehicle’s communication link, especially regarding latency and uplink, which can easily exceed the limits of communication standards like Long Term Evolution (LTE). Therefore, the development of the communication system for the newly developed autonomous monorail vehicle MONOCAB aims towards the use of the 5G standard. This paper presents experiences and measurements from a first outdoor field test conducted in the context of monitoring and remotely controlling the MONOCAB via 5G. Previously, all communication services were subjected to ITU-T Y.1564 compliant tests for the network planning and the deployment of a 5G Non-Public Network (NPN). This deployed 5G NPN was then used to test remote monitoring the MONOCAB, at it’s first public presentation on the 3rd of October 2022, by transmitting video streams and telemetry data from the vehicle to a central control station. Additionally, a glass-to-glass latency measurement of a video stream transmitted via 5G was conducted, to point out the latency impact of 5G.
  • Publication
    Increasing Ethernet TSN Multi-Protocol Interoperability by Algorithmic Configuration Merge
    Standardization and prototyping of Ethernet Time Sensitive Networking (TSN) makes progress and its mechanisms are utilized with various application protocols and technologies within the industrial automation domain. Sharing Ethernet TSN mechanisms in multi-protocol networks impacts interoperability. Although the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) and the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) attempt to unify Ethernet TSN utilization with the IEC/IEEE 60802 TSN Profile for Industrial Automation, Ethernet TSN devices already exists on the market by different vendors. An area of conflict is the egress configuration of a single Ethernet-Interface for TSN streams of different technologies, such as PROFINET, CC-Link IE TSN and OPC UA Field eXchange. A practical post processing solution can be to merge Ethernet TSN configurations for a single port. A concept for a Configuration Merge Algorithm (COMEA) is presented in this work. A test environment consisting of multiple industrial automation applications with an Ethernet TSN network infrastructure is used to demonstrate the result of application
  • Publication
    Determining the Target Security Level for Automated Security Risk Assessments
    ( 2023)
    Ehrlich, Marco
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    Bröring, Andre
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    Diedrich, Christian
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    Kastner, Wolfgang
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    Trsek, Henning
    Due to Industry 4.0 developments, the demanded modularity of manufacturing systems generates additional manual efforts for security experts to guarantee a secure operation. The rising utilization of information and the frequent changes of system structures necessitate a continuous and automated security engineering, especially by application of the mandatory security risk assessments. Collecting the required information for these assessments and formalising expert knowledge shall improve the security of modular manufacturing systems in the future. In order to automate the security risk assessment process, this work proposes a method to determine the Target Security Level (SL-T) in conformance to the IEC 62443 standard based on the MITRE ATT&CK framework and the Intel Threat Agent Library (TAL).
  • Publication
    Evaluation Concept for Prototypical Implementation towards Automated Security Risk Assessments
    ( 2023)
    Ehrlich, Marco
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    Bröring, Andre
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    Trsek, Henning
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    ;
    Diedrich, Christian
    Due to Industry 4.0 developments, the demanded modularity of manufacturing systems generates additional manual efforts for security experts to guarantee a secure operation. The rising utilization of information and the frequent changes of systems necessitate continuous security engineering. Therefore, this work in progress presents the specification and prototypical implementation for automated security risk assessments. In addition, an outlook towards the associated validation, verification, evaluation, and hypothesis testing is given.
  • Publication
    Towards automated risk assessments for modular manufacturing systems
    ( 2023)
    Ehrlich, Marco
    ;
    Bröring, Andre
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    Diedrich, Christian
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    Manufacturing systems based on Industry 4.0 concepts provide a greater availability of data and have modular characteristics enabling frequent changes. This raises the need for new security engineering concepts that cover the increasing complexity and frequency of mandatory security risk assessments. In contrast, the current standardization landscape used for the assessment of these systems only offers abstract, static, manual, and resource-intensive procedures. Therefore, this work proposes a method that further specifies the IEC 62443 aiming to automate the security risk assessments in such a way that manual efforts can be reduced and a consistent quality can be achieved. The methodology is presented using network segmentation as a guiding example and consists of four main steps: Information collection based on a process analysis, information formalisation with a semi-formal model, information usage applying first order logic to extract expert knowledge, and information access using the concept of the digital twin. In addition, the applicability of the IEC 62443 standard to the risk assessment of modular manufacturing systems is evaluated.
  • Publication
    Network Digital Twins: A Key-Enabler for Zero-Touch Management in Industrial Communication Systems
    ( 2023)
    Friesen, Maxim
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    Abedin, Sarder Fakhrul
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    Gidlund, Mikael
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    Current industrial communication systems (ICS) are undergoing a transformation, leveraging a multitude of technologies to meet the specific needs of the manufacturing and automation industries. The convergence of these networks into edge, fog, and cloud architectures has enhanced their scalability and facilitated the deployment of advanced data-driven approaches, such as machine learning for optimizing production processes. However, ensuring proper provisioning of network and computation resources, along with delivering quality of service, is increasingly challenging in these complex communication systems. Zero-Touch Management (ZTM) frameworks promise to reduce complexity and minimize dependence on manual configuration by human experts. Successful deployment of such frameworks requires an accurate Network Digital Twin (NDT) of relevant network elements, as autonomous decision-making heavily relies on the quantity and quality of historical and real-time node and link state information provided by the NDT. However, the use of NDTs for ICS and ZTM in particular is still an emerging research topic. This paper therefore proposes a theoretical use-case for an NDT-based ZTM framework to improve resource utilization in cloud-centered networks. It presents a state-of-the-art analysis of recent NDT advances enabling the deployment of related ZTM approaches and discusses associated challenges and future research directions.
  • Publication
    Machine Learning for Zero-Touch Management in Heterogeneous Industrial Networks
    ( 2022)
    Friesen, Maxim
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    Wisniewski, Lukasz
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    Over the past decades industrial communication networks have evolved into highly diverse and heterogeneous environments, with a variety of different technologies being deployed to address the diverse requirements of manufacturing-and automation-specific use cases. These include stringent latency limits, high availability and reliability, as well as deterministic communication behavior. To assure the necessary allocation of re-sources and provisioning of required Quality-of-Service in highly diverse communication systems, a holistic network management approach is needed that can serve all cornerstones of modern industrial networks. More recently, this lead to the development of new adaptive and agile management approaches that imple-ment autonomous and self-organizing manufacturing networks, whereby Machine Learning (ML) methods started to become an integral part for overcoming the limiting factors of practically deploying such systems. Due to the growing complexity of today's networking environments, defining network management policies based on expert knowledge becomes increasingly difficult. ML has evolved as a promising technique to extract knowledge from collected data to enable cognitive network management approaches. This paper reviews past advances in ML applications for zero touch management of heterogeneous industrial communication networks. It illustrates how a network's management life-cycle that is based on digital twin technology can harnesses the potentials of ML to bring the concepts of organic computing and zero-touch cognitive manufacturing within industrial networks closer to reality. Lastly, recent papers that discuss the use of ML approaches for self-x features in Zero-Touch Management (ZTM) network environments are surveyed and relevant open issues are discussed.
  • Publication
    Der Beitrag von Reallaboren zur digitalen Transformation in Kommunen
    Im diesem Beitrag werden Reallabore als Möglichkeits- und Lernräume im kommunalen Kontext vorgestellt. Der Schwerpunkt liegt dabei auf der digitalen Transformation und den Möglichkeiten von Realexperimenten. Die von der Wissenschaft übernommenen Aufgaben im Reallabor gehen über die Aufgaben in der klassischen Forschung hinaus und ermöglichen ein verändertes Zusammenspiel von Theorie und Praxis, das die Akteure dabei unterstützt, Transformationsprozesse vor Ort anzustoßen und zu begleiten. Die Partner brauchen hierfür ein gemeinsames Verständnis einer Zielevision. Das Reallabor ermöglicht es den Akteuren von- und miteinander zu lernen. Am Beispiel von Lemgo Digital wird der Aufbau eines Reallabors für die Digitale Transformation in Mittelstädten beschrieben.
  • Publication
    IoT Device Management Based on Open Source Platforms - Requirements Analysis and Evaluation
    ( 2022)
    Gustin, Denis
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    The internet of things (IoT) requires an efficient management of all devices. Operation in potentially insecure environments, limited processing capability of the IoT devices and unreliable connectivity create the need of suitable Device Management (DM) solutions. But with the IoT being complex and diverse, the criteria for finding the right DM solution differ depending on the application-specific requirements of the given IoT system. In this paper, we develop a rating system for IoT DM solutions, which can be easily adapted. The criteria are represented with the FCAPS and the life cycle management models. Additionally, we conduct an evaluation of open source IoT platforms in contrast to commercial solutions.