By building on knowledge, solutions, and standards from other systems and industries, the best security solutions can be utilized for each portion of the smart grid communications network. Clearly, Internet-based protocols, such as IPv4 and IPv6, which have been developed over many years, and which have widespread use, will provide a cost-effective baseline transport. Layering the suite of security protocols developed for IP [such as IPSec and Transport Layer Security (TLS)] on this baseline transport capitalizes on the vast work done in this area by protocol and industry experts.