Research Associate: Cyber Security of Industrial Control Systems

Role description

The Bristol Cyber Security Group, led by Professor Awais Rashid, is seeking to appoint a post-doc on cyber security of industrial control systems. The group forms part of the Academic Centre of Excellence in Cyber Security Research (ACE-CSR) at Bristol.

You will join a major programme of research focusing on cyber security of large-scale infrastructures, e.g., water, power, etc. that underpin everyday lives in society. You will develop innovative research that puts you at the forefront of work on understanding vulnerabilities of such infrastructures, attack pathways and novel solutions to detect such attacks and mitigate them.

You will play a key role in the on-going development of a state-of-the-art comprehensive testbed infrastructure for security of industrial control systems. The testbed includes a comprehensive set of devices used in the control and instrumentation of industrial control systems as well as physical processes on water treatment, manufacturing, building management as well as Industrial IoT platforms and devices. You will play a key role in studying vulnerabilities, developing reference attack scenarios and new types of vulnerability analyses approaches, attack modelling techniques as well as countermeasures such as intrusion detection and isolation mechanisms for detection and mitigation of attacks. This is an experimental research post with hands-on research as part of an extensive and growing portfolio of research projects.

The position offers an exciting opportunity to combine research concepts and ideas with real world problems and their solutions and play a key role in defining a research agenda for experimental research in this area.

You will also work in collaboration with a critical mass of researchers within the Bristol Cyber Security Group and the wider Academic Centre of Excellence in Cyber Security Research. The Group participates in several major initiative, including leading projects as part of the Research Institute on Science of Cyber Security (RISCS) and the Research Institute on Trustworthy Cyber-Physical Systems (RITICS), co-leading the Security and Safety stream within the UK Research Hub on Cyber Security of Internet of Things and leading the programme of work on developing a Cyber Security Body of Knowledge (CyBOK). The group also leads a recently awarded EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training on Trust, Identity, Privacy and Security in Large-scale Infrastructures. There is a strong expectation that you will actively contribute to the strong profile of Cyber Security at Bristol and its inter-disciplinary ethos through participation in the development and publication of research results.

Additional information

For informal discussion about the post you are welcome to contact: Professor Awais Rashid ( awais.rashid@bristol.ac.uk ) or Dr. Barney Craggs ( barney.craggs@bristol.ac.uk ).

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