A PORTAL TO CUTTING EDGE RESEARCH INTO THE CYBER SECURITY OF CYBER-PHYSICAL, CRITICAL SYSTEMS

RITICS Mission

The programme is funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) and the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC), and is coordinated by the Institute for Security Science and Technology at Imperial College London.

RESEARCH

Conduct research which advances knowledge in areas identified as having the greatest potential to transform the academic state-of-the-art and user practice

ENGAGEMENT

Provide a focus for liaison with stakeholders from the NCSC, and other parts of government and business

IMPACT

Outputs will be disseminated, promoted and applied, where appropriate, to improve cyber security of cyber-physical systems and critical infrastructure in the UK as a whole

Funding

Projects

People

News

What are Critical Systems?

Critical systems are those that provide critical services, such as transport, energy, water and telecommunications. Underpinning services, such as high-value manufacturing, are also considered critical systems.

These critical systems can be described as being cyber-physical, in that they contain networked computers which can control physical parameters.

This opens them up to cyber security threats, which can have physical consequences.

RITICS Aims

To understand the harm that threats pose to the provision of critical systems
To confidently articulate these threats as risk to delivery of critical systems at a business and national level
To identify novel effective and efficient interventions for business or governments to reduce the risks to critical systems

To understand and compare both the effectiveness and costs of potential interventions. This includes technical interventions, such as altering system architecture, through to policy interventions by governments and regulators
To best detect intrusion in critical systems, including embedded and bespoke systems, and identify whether incident response differ to established practices for enterprise IT
To identify the obstacles to (perceived) best practice being applied to critical systems

RITICS is coordinated by the Institute for Security Science and Technology; Imperial College London’s hub for security research and engagement.

At the Institute for Security Science and Technology we coordinate interdisciplinary and trans-disciplinary research in security across Imperial College London. We further act as a security science, technology and innovation interface for academia, government and industry.