A Georgia Tech cybersecurity researcher is helping define how artificial intelligence can be safely deployed to manage the U.S. power grid, as utilities increasingly rely on AI tools for real-time monitoring and control. Saman Zonouz, an associate professor in Georgia Tech's School of Cybersecurity and Privacy and School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, directs the university's Cyber-Physical Systems Security Research Laboratory, where his team studies how AI can both protect and expose critical infrastructure.
Zonouz's projects combine AI with existing power system operational knowledge to detect cyberattacks in near real time, and his lab has identified security vulnerabilities in solar inverters and other grid-connected devices. Much of the funding for the work comes from the U.S. Department of Energy. A central theme of the research is resilience: building grid systems that continue operating safely even if the AI monitoring them fails or is compromised, rather than assuming any AI system will be infallible.
Zonouz also sits on a planning committee for the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, which is organizing an October workshop focused on integrating AI into the electricity system. He has described AI's role in grid management as serving simultaneously as a protective tool and a potential target, underscoring the dual-use nature of the technology as it becomes more embedded in national energy infrastructure.
Source: Georgia Tech College of Computing -- https://www.cc.gatech.edu/news/gt-cybersecurity-expert-helping-chart-future-ai-energy-grid