Industrial Automation and Control System Cybersecurity in Industry 4.0 Era towards CBRNe Protection

Dear Colleagues,

This upcoming Special Issue of Applied Sciences, entitled "Industrial Automation and Control System Cybersecurity in Industry 4.0 Era towards CBRNe Protection", is looking to gather scientific papers that explore the use of industrial automation and control systems (IACS) in order to enhance cybersecurity in Industry 4.0 for CBRNe protection.

Cybersecurity is becoming crucial, as more IACSs are being made available in cyberspace. As recent events have demonstrated, cyberspace must be considered the new theatre of warfare and has the potential to undermine the stability of a country. Cyberwarfare and cyberterrorism were coined to better describe this threat and there is growing concern among governments that they are not fully ready to face such an emerging menace. In this scenario, CBRNe intelligence will play an extremely important role in preventing the malicious use of an otherwise beneficial asset.

This Special Issue focuses on cybersecurity aspects for IACS, particularly in the context of Industry 4.0, which can be characterized by the integration and joint use of:

• Different types of complex sensors, which detect changes in the source/environment and collect signals, providing the reaction to ensure control;
• Ddvanced technologies such as the internet of things (IoT), big data, and cloud computing, which allow researchers to improve risk mitigation in system cybersecurity;
• Decision support systems (DSS), which are intended to help decision-makers to gather useful information from a combination of raw data, documents, and personal knowledge.

This Special Issue invites original research articles and review papers that target industrial automation, network and control cybersecurity protocols and architectures for different domains, attack detection and response techniques for cyber threats, artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning (ML), digital twin (DT), IoT and blockchain technology. These topics should be applied to CBRNe prediction, planning, and emergency management. 

This Issue is aiming to solicit submissions from researchers, engineers, managers, and practitioners who are involved in developing and implementing industrial automation and control systems for CBRNe protection.

The scope of this Special Issue includes, but is not limited to, the following topics:

• CBRNe events prediction and management for Industry 4.0 IACS;
• IACS cybersecurity threats and vulnerabilities problems and protection;
• Cyber-physical systems security for CBRNe protection (sensors, hardware, software, DSS);
• AI, DT and blockchain for enhancing cybersecurity and safety of IACS;
• IoT, AI, smart sensors and systems applications for emergencies prevention and risk reduction during disasters and post-emergency monitoring;
• AI, ML and data analytics for controlling and securing IACS: prediction, prevention, detection, tolerance, recovery, and relearning;
• IoT and AI as objects and/or tools and/or protection mechanisms for cyberattacks development;
• Privacy issues in IoT;
• CBRNe protection, including attacks detection, diagnosis, classification and response;
• Critical infrastructure risks and control, cybersecurity architectures, protocols and frameworks for IACS.

Additionally, we invite contributions (original or extended versions of conference papers) from the Scientific International Conference SICC CBRNe.

We look forward to receiving your contributions.

Dr. Oleg Illiashenko
Dr. Andrea Malizia
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Applied Sciences is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• cybersecurity
• cyber warfare, cyber terrorism
• safety, functional safety
• industrial automation and control systems
• Industry 4.0
• artificial intelligence
• internet of things
• big data
• data mining
• decision support systems
• CBRNe