Athanasios Liatifis

University of Western Macedonia | UOWM · Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering

NANCY aims to introduce a secure and intelligent architecture for the beyond the fifth generation (B5G) wireless network. Leveraging AI and blockchain, NANCY enables secure and intelligent resource management, flexible networking, and orchestration. In this direction, novel architectures, namely point-to-point (P2P) connectivity for device-to-device connectivity, mesh networking, and relay-based communications, as well as protocols for medium access, mobility management, and resource allocation, will be designed. These architectures and protocols will make the most by jointly optimizing the midhaul, and fronthaul. This is expected to enable genuinely distributed intelligence and transform the network to a low-power computer. Likewise, by following a holistic optimization approach and leveraging the developments in blockchain, NANCY aims to support E2E personalized, multitenant and perpetual protection.

In the era of hyper-connected digital economies, the smart technologies play a vital role in the operation of the Electrical Power and Energy Systems (EPES), transforming it into a new, decentralised model with multiple benefits, such as distributed generation, pervasive control, remote monitoring, and self-healing. However, the growing number of cybersecurity incidents in EPES promotes the need for shielding against a variety of threats, ranging from cyberattacks, dynamic and evolving Advanced Persistent Threats (APTs), and privacy violations, to electricity disturbances and severe human errors caused by lack of relevant training. The diverse threats that modern EPES are facing require novel and holistic solutions that employ cutting-edge technologies to detect and mitigate threats, while continuously assessing the dynamic EPES environment, ensuring compliance with the latest cybersecurity standards and training the EPES personnel to appropriately respond to cybersecurity incidents and mitigate the human-error factor. Considering these, ELECTRON aims at delivering a new-generation EPES platform, capable of empowering the resilience of energy systems against cyber, privacy, and data attacks through four main pillars (risk assessment and certification, anomaly detection and prevention, failure mitigation and energy restoration, and addressing internal threats and gaps through AR-VR-based personnel training and certification), while fostering the cyber protection standardisation and certification via three novel authorities, namely the cybersecurity lighthouse, the cybersecurity training and certification authority, and the energy trading centre.