Vulnerability of Traffic Control System under Cyber- Attacks Using Falsified Data

Existing traffic control systems are mostly deployed in private wired networks. With the development of wireless technology, vehicles and infrastructure devices will be connected through wireless communications, which might open a new door for cyber attackers. It is still not clear what types of cyber-attacks can be performed through infrastructure-toinfrastructure (I2I) and vehicle-to-infrastructure (V2I) communications, whether such attacks can introduce critical failure to the system, and what impacts of cyber-attacks on traffic operations are. This paper investigates the vulnerability of traffic control system in a connected environment, where four typical elements including signal controllers, vehicle detectors, roadside units (RSUs), and onboard units (OBUs) are identified as the attack surfaces. The paper mainly focuses on attacking actuated and adaptive signal control systems by sending falsified data, which is considered as an indirect but realistic attack approach. The objective of an attacker is to maximize system delay with constraints such as budget and attack intensity. Empirical results show that different attack scenarios result in significant differences regarding delay and some ineffective attacks may even improve the system performance. Simulation results from a real world corridor show that critical intersections, which has a higher impact on congestion, can be identified by analyzing the attack locations. Identification of such intersections can be helpful in designing a more resilient transportation network.