North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) Continues to Address Cyber Security

In the effort to better secure the North American power grid from cyber attack, significant milestones have been reached by NERC’s Critical Infrastructure Protection program. “Cyber security and critical infrastructure protection continue to be a top priority for our organization as we work to ensure the reliability of the bulk power system in North America,” commented NERC’s CEO, Rick Sergel.

Sergel recently announced significant progress has been made in the following areas of the program:

Revised Cyber Security Standards Recently Approved:
The standards have been filed for regulatory approval in the United States and are already mandatory and enforceable in parts of Canada.

Special Cyber Risk Preparedness Assessment to Begin:
Generalized, aggregated results from the assessment will be used to inform standards development activities, alert the industry to potential areas of concern, and identify areas where research and development investment is needed.

Secure Alerting Portal Enters Pre-Launch Testing Phase:
This new portal will facilitate NERC’s alerts process, whereby the organization is able to notify nearly 5,000 industry personnel at utilities, grid operations centers, power plants, and transmission facilities of emerging vulnerabilities as they arise.

Electric Industry Education Initiative:
Scheduled to begin with a series of online webinars, the initiative will include secured and classified industry briefings coordinated with the U.S. and Canadian governments.

To learn more about the status of this NERC program, click here.