IEC 61508 Certification Program FAQ V2R3!6!2012
IEC 61508 Certification Program FAQ V2R3!6!2012
Cyber-Security
exida
Sellersville, PA 18960, USA, +1-215-453-1720
Munich, Germany, +49 89 4900 0547
1 exida Certification Program
The exida IEC 61508 Certification Program was established in 2005 in response to demand
primarily from end users in the process industries and manufacturers of instrumentation
products. There was a need to provide a higher quality of technical expertise with effective
and responsive service for these manufacturers.
The exida IEC 61508 Certification Program offers the most comprehensive product review of
any certification agency resulting in products that are safer, more secure and more reliable.
The exida IEC 61508 Certification Program requires that a full Safety Case be prepared
for each certification project. A Safety Case is a complete list of all requirements of
stated standards along with arguments and evidence that the product under certification
meets all requirements. It is an essential tool to ensure completeness of the certification
audit thereby finding potentially dangerous flaws in a product design. Despite the
proven value of this technique, few certification agencies prepare a Safety Case.
exida prepares a Certification Report summarizing the audit information in a public
format. This report and a Certificate are publically posted on the exida website under
the "Safety Automation Equipment List," www.sael-online.com. This web resource
provides the most up to date and comprehensive listing of functional safety and cyber-
security certifications available.
exida performs a Failure Modes Effects and Diagnostic Analysis (FMEDA) for all
certification projects. Each analysis is backed up by extensive fault injection testing and
a detailed field failure study. This analysis suite results in the most accurate failure rate
and failure mode information. This analysis covers both dangerous failures and failure
that cause a false trip, Unlike other agencies, exida does not accept manufacturer's
warranty failure studies alone as those studies typically show very optimistic results.
Unlike other agencies, exida does not depend upon "cycle testing" to show random
mechanical failure rates. This cycle testing technique does provide random failure rate
estimates and useful life information for high demand applications but this data should
never be used to represent low demand random failure rates. exida always uses the
reliable FMEDA technique which is backed up by over ten billion unit operating hours of
field failure data.
The exida Certification Program is operated globally by exida.com L.L.C. with work performed
by its subsidiary companies. Assessors from exida are assigned on a project basis. The exida
program ensures an impartial, independent audit and assessment.
2.5 Is a Notified Body required for IEC 61508 certification in the E.U.?
A Notified Body in the European Union (E.U.) is similar to a NRTL in the U.S. Notified Bodies
must also pass strict criteria for measurement and calibration. This is not relevant to IEC 61508
nor is Notified Body status required for an organization to issue IEC 61508 certifications as IEC
61508 is not listed under a specific European Directive but is a Basic Safety Publication
applicable to many application areas where no specific functional safety rules exist.
2.6 Where does exida get the failure rate data needed for probabilistic
analysis?
exida uses several techniques to generate and validate failure rate data. The primary technique
is an FMEDA of both mechanical and electrical components. The FMEDA analysis uses a the
exida component databases [exi12a, exi12b] which are calibrated for several application
environments including low demand process industry applications. The databases are verified
by over ten billion unit operating hours of field experience primarily in the process industries. For
high demand applications exida requires a "cycle test" as evidence of useful life and failure rate.
exida also does a manufacturer warranty return study to verify FMEDA results.
Unlike other agencies, exida does not accept manufacturer warranty return studies as exclusive
failure rate data evidence because such studies typically have very optimistic assumptions
[exi11]. Nor does exida accept "cycle test" as exclusive evidence of failure rate data for high
demand applications as these tests often provide very low failure rates.
2.10 How should exida IEC 61508 certification differ from other certification
schemes?
The IEC 61508 standard is a large specification with each subclause being a requirement. The
standard states: To conform to this standard it shall be demonstrated that the requirements
have been satisfied to the required criteria specified and therefore, for each clause or sub-
clause, all the objectives have been met.
In the opinion of exida, this statement requires a Safety Case or Safety Justification to the
requirements of IEC 61508. A simple certificate and certification report stating general
compliance with a standard does not fulfill the IEC 61508 requirements. A full Safety Case lists
all IEC 61508 requirements and provides the arguments and justification as to how each project
meets the standard. exida does a Safety Case for each certification project.
In addition, the exida Certification program looks at usability of a product from a systems
perspective and evaluates the likelihood of unintended misuse. Although this is not part of
many certification programs, the exida End User Advisory Council has strongly suggested this
interpretation of IEC 61508 requirements.
The logos above represent some of the many product manufacturers who have successfully
received a certification from exida.
Several such industry specific standards have now been developed with more on the way. IEC
61511 has been written for the process industries. IEC 62061 has been written to address
exida, 2012 IEC 61508 Certification Program Frequently Asked Questions
Page 8 of 17
machinery safety. IEC 61513 has been written for the nuclear industry. EN 50128 has been
written to address safety-related software for the railroad industry. All of these standards build
directly on IEC 61508 and reference it accordingly.
IEC 61508 does not cover safety issues like electric shock, hazardous falls, long-term exposure
to a toxic substance, etc.; these issues are covered by other standards. IEC 61508 also does
not cover low safety E/E/PE systems where a single E/E/PE system is capable of providing the
necessary risk reduction and the required safety integrity of the E/E/PE system is less than
safety integrity level 1, i.e., the E/E/PE system is only available 90 percent of the time or less.
1 Concept
Overall Scope
2
ANALYSIS Definition
Overall Safety
4
Requirements
Safety Requirements
5
Allocation
Safety integrity levels (SILs) are order of magnitude levels of risk reduction. There are four SILs
defined in IEC 61508. SIL1 has the lowest level of risk reduction. SIL4 has the highest level of
risk reduction. The SIL table for demand mode is shown in Figure 2. The SIL table for the
continuous mode is shown in Figure 3.
Probability of failure
Safety Integrity on demand, average
Level (Low Demand mode of
operation)
3.4 COMPLIANCE
The IEC 61508 standard states: To conform to this standard it shall be demonstrated that the
requirements have been satisfied to the required criteria specified (for example safety integrity
level) and therefore, for each clause or sub-clause, all the objectives have been met.
Because IEC 61508 is technically only a standard and not a law, compliance is not always
legally required. However, in many instances, compliance is identified as best practice and thus
can be cited in liability cases. Also, many countries have incorporated IEC 61508 or large parts
of the standard directly into their safety codes, so in those instances it indeed has the force of
law. Finally, many industry and government contracts for safety equipment, systems, and
services specifically require compliance with IEC 61508. So although IEC 61508 originated as a
standard, its wide acceptance has led to legally required compliance in many cases.
Note: The term Safety Case is being used beyond its original definition [DEF97] in the context
of product certification to IEC 61508 and is based on concepts presented and developed earlier
[BIS98].
A typical assessment (Figure 3) begins with a complete review of the written safety
management system (SMS) / Functional Safety Management (FSM) plan. This should be a
document or set of documents that describe the process by which a new product is to be
developed and modified. The information contained should include all design steps (inputs
required, processes to be performed and outputs required), all verification activities,
responsibilities and all project documentation generated.
Product requirements and design documents are reviewed next. The documents supplied
should match those required in the functional safety management plan. Evidence that the
required verification activities have been done shall be included. Competency records must be
in place and show that those assigned to the project were competent to perform their specific
tasks. When the paper review is complete, the assessment continues with detailed on-site
meetings.
On-site Meetings:
Procedures Used?
Actual Documents
Created?
Validation Testing
Problems?
Audit Certification
Documentation
When all relevant documents are reviewed, interviews with the responsible personnel must take
place. This is done by visiting the development and manufacturing control site(s). One of the
key interview questions is What process was followed in the design of this project? and Have
the safety requirements been implemented the product. It is surprising how often the answer
varies from the process described in the functional safety management plan or from the
documented safety concept. Any discrepancies must be justified and documented by
modifications to the project specific functional safety management plan and safety concept.
The site visit must also include witnessed validation testing often including specific fault injection
tests.
4 REFERENCES
[BIS98] Peter G. Bishop and Robin E. Bloomfield, "A Methodology for Safety Case Development", in
Safety-Critical Systems Symposium, Birmingham, UK, February 1998.
http://citeseer.ist.psu.edu/bishop98methodology.html
[DEF97] Defence Standard 00 55, Parts 1 and 2, Issue 2, August 1997, U.K. Ministry of Defence.
[exi11] Goble, W. M., Field Failure Rates - The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly, exida, Sellersville, PA,
2011, www.exida.com.
[IEC00] IEC 61508, Functional Safety of electrical / electronic / programmable electronic safety-related
systems, Geneva: Switzerland, 2000.
[TUV00] Requirements Database Review, Report #: eS 70177T, TV Product Service Inc., October, 20,
2000.
Future Enhancements
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