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Reference Architecture of Cybersecurity Digital Twin

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Enterprise Design, Operations, and Computing. EDOC 2024 Workshops (EDOC 2024)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Business Information Processing ((LNBIP,volume 537))

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Abstract

The transformation of previously isolated Critical Infrastructures (CIs) into intricate Systems-of-Systems has rendered them vulnerable to various threats. CIs are characterized by long life cycles and high availability requirements, which pose significant challenges in maintaining cybersecurity throughout their operational life cycle. Existing testing methodologies prove inadequate and may compromise the CI’s operational continuity. This paper proposes to shift testing activities to a Digital Twin (DT) connected to the CI. The DT provides a digital counterpart of the real system, enabling cost-effective testing without compromising operational integrity. For this approach, we present an enterprise architecture called the cybersecurity DT reference architecture. Through a camera surveillance system use case, we demonstrate the feasibility of this reference architecture, focusing on what-if testing using DT-enabled attack simulations. We show how to enhance decision-making when evaluating system configurations and how to deploy optimized configurations to the real system.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    https://www.opengroup.org/archimate-forum/archimate-overview.

  2. 2.

    High-resolution images of the models available in: https://gitlab.utwente.nl/itapelto/whattwin.

  3. 3.

    https://attack.mitre.org/resources/working-with-attack/.

  4. 4.

    https://cve.mitre.org/.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Semantics Cybersecurity and Services (EEMCS-SCS), University of Twente, PO BOX 217, 7500 AE, Enschede, The Netherlands

    Taru Itäpelto, Mohammed Elhajj & Marten van Sinderen

  2. Section Industrial Engineering and Business Information Systems (BMS-HBE-IEBIS), University of Twente, PO BOX 217, 7500 AE, Enschede, The Netherlands

    Maria Iacob

Authors
  1. Taru Itäpelto
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  2. Mohammed Elhajj
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  3. Marten van Sinderen
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  4. Maria Iacob
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Taru Itäpelto .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Duisburg-Essen, Essen, Germany

    Monika Kaczmarek-Heß

  2. Niederrhein University of Applied Sciences, Mönchengladbach, Germany

    Kristina Rosenthal

  3. Czech Technical University in Prague, Prague, Czech Republic

    Marek Suchánek

  4. Universidade de Lisboa, Lisbon, Portugal

    Miguel Mira Da Silva

  5. TU Wien, Vienna, Austria

    Henderik A. Proper

  6. TU Wien, Vienna, Austria

    Marianne Schnellmann

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Itäpelto, T., Elhajj, M., van Sinderen, M., Iacob, M. (2025). Reference Architecture of Cybersecurity Digital Twin. In: Kaczmarek-Heß, M., Rosenthal, K., Suchánek, M., Da Silva, M.M., Proper, H.A., Schnellmann, M. (eds) Enterprise Design, Operations, and Computing. EDOC 2024 Workshops . EDOC 2024. Lecture Notes in Business Information Processing, vol 537. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-79059-1_24

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-79059-1_24

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  • Online ISBN: 978-3-031-79059-1

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