PARROT - Plug-n-play Appliance for Resilient Response of Operational Technologies

TECHNOLOGY LICENSING OPPORTUNITY

PARROT Plug-n-play Appliance for Resilient Response of Operational Technologies

A device that provides increased cybersecurity for critical infrastructure without interrupting normal operations.

Opportunity: Idaho National Laboratory (INL), managed and operated by Battelle Energy Alliance, LLC (BEA), is offering the opportunity to enter into a license and/or collaborative research agreement to commercialize PARROT.

Overview: Control systems are often tasked with managing complex, potentially dangerous physical processes. Unauthorized or malicious access to a control system may have serious consequences, including damage to the physical process, harm to personnel, release of potentially dangerous materials, and so on.

There are currently no devices that allow for an automated indication and response at a distributed level to ensure continued operations of FCDs for multiple industries when a cyberattack occurs. Even with the advancement of information technologies security designs into the operational technology (OT) environment, automated response technologies are essentially non-existent and do not consider the unique functional considerations of a plant control system.

Description: PARROT is a device that can be inserted between the communications and power pins of any field control device (FCD), such as a programmable logic controller, to provide for continued operation while monitoring for anomalous behavior. Using external, diverse indicators of cyberattack through anomaly detection (i.e. temperature variations, communications packet changes, and other cyber-physical indicators), a response action is taken by the PARROT device to selectively isolate the communications from the FCD to the upstream human machine interfaces (HMI) or downstream valves/actuators. The power can also be isolated, as necessary, to limit destruction.

While the mounting will be specific to any FCD backplane, the new interface will allow for a range of functionality to be performed during isolation from degraded operation up to, and including, full operation through a full copy of the functionality. The indicators and automated responses are designed to counteract the threat before irrecoverable impact and isolate upstream communications. With only upstream isolation, the PARROT device provides for an isolated connection to a local monitoring device to allow for operators, lineman, and other personnel to remotely continue critical operations.

Benefits:

• Currently, no other devices exist with these capabilities
• Designed to counteract a threat before irrecoverable impact
• Allows local operators and lineman to continue operation during an attack

Applications:

• Critical infrastructure protection
  • New and legacy devices

Development Status: Early concept hardware. Looking for partner for collaborative development to fully test concept.

IP Status: Patent Application No. 16/990,972, Systems and Methods for Control System Security, BEA Docket No. BA-1085.

INL is seeking a commercial partner to for collaborative development and to license the above intellectual property to a company with a demonstrated ability to bring such inventions to the market. Exclusive rights in defined fields of use may be available.

Please visit Technology Deployment's website at https://inl.gov/inl-initiatives/technology-deployment for more information on working with INL and the industrial partnering and technology transfer process.

Companies interested in learning more about this licensing opportunity should contact Jon Cook at td@inl.gov or 208-526-2261.