  The reported work points at developing a practical approach for power
transmission planners to secure power networks from potential deliberate
attacks. We study the interaction between a system planner (defender) and a
rational attacker who threatens the operation of the power grid. In addition to
the commonly used hardening strategy for protecting the network, a new sort of
resource is introduced under the deception concept. Feint and deception are
acknowledged as effective tools for misleading the attacker in strategic
planning. To this end, the defender deception is mathematically formulated by
releasing misinformation about his plan in the shared cognition-based model. To
reduce the risk of damage in case of deception failure, preemptive-goal
programming is utilized to prioritize the hardening strategy for the vital
components. Furthermore, the value of posturing is introduced which is the
benefits that the deception brings to the system. The problems are formulated
as tri-level mixed-integer linear programming and solved by the
constraint-and-column generation method. Comprehensive simulation studies
performed on WSCC 9-bus and IEEE 118-bus systems indicate how the defender will
save significant cost from protecting his network with posturing rather than
hardening and the proposed approach is a promising development to ensure the
secure operation of power networks.

Systems and Control;Systems and Control;Optimization and Control