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With the proliferation of Smart Grid technologies and IP-based Process Control and Condition Monitoring Systems for power system operations, bulk electric system (BES) is now more dependent on real-time information exchange between control centre and remote end Intelligent Electronic Devices (IED’s) for monitoring and optimizing the transmission and distribution of electricity. Because of this, there are growing concerns on cyber security issues that brought by these technologies. It was noted that attention has been drawn to the security framework for engineering applications/systems and their own local area network (LAN), but the security and reliability of the communication channels for supporting these applications/system have been taken for granted. This paper summarizes how The Hongkong Electric Co., Ltd. (the Company) has designed and built an IP-based Data Communication Network (DCN) for engineering applications with due consideration on the system security and reliability.