  The increasing need for reducing greenhouse gas emissions and the drive for
green cities have promoted the use of electric vehicles due to their
environmental benefits. In fact, countries have set their own targets and are
offering incentives for people to purchase EVs as opposed to traditional
gasoline-powered cars. Manufacturers have been hastily deploying charging
stations to meet the charging requirements of the EVs on the road. This rapid
deployment has contributed to the EV ecosystem's lack of proper security
measures, raising multiple questions related to the power grid security and
vulnerability. In this paper, we offer a complete examination of the EV
ecosystem from the vulnerability to the attacks and finally the solutions. We
start by examining the existing vulnerabilities in the EV ecosystem that can be
exploited to control the EV charging and launch attacks against the power grid.
We then discuss the non-linear nature of the EV charging load and simulate
multiple attacks that can be launched against the power grid using these EVs.
EV loads have high reactive power demand which can have a larger impact on the
grid compared to residential loads. We perform simulations on two power grids
and demonstrate that while the grid can recover after a 48 MW attack utilizing
traditional residential loads, a smaller 30 MW EV load attack can completely
destabilize the system. Finally, we suggest several patches for the existing
vulnerabilities and discuss two methods aimed at detecting EV attacks.
