An award of $18.8 million from the DOE and the Department of Homeland Security to four universities is to fund research into securing the grid, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign told the press Friday.  It will work with the University of California at Davis, Dartmouth College and Washington State University in a research program called Trustworthy Cyber Infrastructure for the Power Grid.

          The grid becomes more vulnerable as it becomes increasingly linked to the internet, thus smart meters hacked by attackers with minimal knowledge and equipment might provide access and cause blackouts, the UC Davis noted.

          “We could open the door to new risks if we carelessly put together new systems that don't have resilience and security guarantees built in from the ground up,” said Ilesanmi Adesida, dean of the college of engineering at the University of Illinois.