A systemic framework for addressing cybersecurity in construction

Turk, Žiga (author), García de Soto, Borja (author), Mantha, Bharadwaj R.K. (author), Maciel, Abel (author), Georgescu, Alexandru (author)

Today, the built environment is designed, built, and managed using digital technology, making it increasingly exposed to cyber security risks. Cybersecurity is a general topic, and the construction sector has been borrowing general solutions and frameworks. However, the construction industry is specific and needs a specialized framework that would assist in understanding and managing cybersecurity. We have studied general cybersecurity frameworks, cybersecurity standards, research literature, and first principles of systems theory and process engineering. Drawing from that, we developed an original framework that identifies three kinds of wrongful activities: stealing, lying, and harming. It identifies four elements that can be affected by wrongful activities: information asset, material asset, person, and system. It defines cybersecurity as the absence of the three wrongs across the four kinds of elements. The framework is construction-specific, and as such, a useful tool for senior management to understand security problems and organize security processes. It can lead to better standardization and also helps the researchers to structure future work on the topic. The latter should be concentrated in areas where construction was found to be different: the dynamic and overlapping process and organizational boundaries in the design stage, the exposed shared design information, and the vulnerability of control information of the built environment, particularly in critical infrastructures.

• Language: English
• Keywords: BIM, construction 4.0, cybersecurity, cyber-physical systems, digitalization, digital twins, Information Technology (IT), Operational Technology (OT), privacy, confidentiality, integrity, CIA triad, Parkerian hexad
• Work type: Article
• Typology: 1.01 - Original Scientific Article
• Organization: FGG - Faculty of Civil and Geodetic Engineering
• Publication status: Published
• Publication version: Version of Record
• Year: 2022
• Number of pages: 14 str.
• Numbering: Vol. 133, art. 103988
• PID: 20.500.12556/RUL-138529
• UDC: 004:624
• ISSN on article: 0926-5805
• DOI: 10.1016/j.autcon.2021.103988
• COBISS.SI-ID: 115454467
• Publication date in RUL: 26.07.2022

TURK, Žiga, GARCÍA DE SOTO, Borja, MANTHA, Bharadwaj R.K., MACIEL, Abel and GEORGESCU, Alexandru, 2022, A systemic framework for addressing cybersecurity in construction. Automation in construction [online]. 2022. Vol. 133,  103988. [Accessed 30 March 2025]. DOI 10.1016/j.autcon.2021.103988. Retrieved from: https://repozitorij.uni-lj.si/IzpisGradiva.php?lang=eng&id=138529

Record is a part of a journal

• Title: Automation in construction
• Shortened title: Autom. constr.
• Publisher: Elsevier
• ISSN: 0926-5805
• COBISS.SI-ID: 14103045

Licences

• License: CC BY-NC-ND 4.0, Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
• Link: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
• Description: The most restrictive Creative Commons license. This only allows people to download and share the work for no commercial gain and for no other purposes.

Secondary language

• Language: Slovenian
• Keywords: BIM, gradbeništvo 4.0, kibernetska varnost, kibernetsko fizični sistemi, digitalizacija, digitalni dvojček

Projects

• Funder: Other - Other funder or multiple funders
• Funding programme: NYUAD Institute
• Project number: CIC4-2020
• Name: 1st Workshop on Cybersecurity Implications of Construction 4.0

• Funder: ARRS - Slovenian Research Agency
• Project number: P2-0210
• Name: E-gradbeništvo