Russia has its finger on the power switch of a number of our nuclear plants - NYTimes

[kstewart33]

The New York Times reports tonight that Russia now has the capability to shut down a number of our nuclear plants. Last summer, the hackers were able to hack the business side of these plants, but now they've hacked up to the power switch.

"Still, new computer screenshots released by the Department of Homeland Security on Thursday made clear that Russian state hackers had the foothold they would have needed to manipulate or shut down power plants.

“We now have evidence they’re sitting on the machines, connected to industrial control infrastructure, that allow them to effectively turn the power off or effect sabotage,” said Eric Chien, a security technology director at Symantec, a digital security firm.

“From what we can see, they were there. They have the ability to shut the power off. All that’s missing is some political motivation,” Mr. Chien said."

IMHO, this is scary as s**t and is a national security crisis. Key question: What will Trump do?

Story link:
[link:https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/15/us/politics/russia-cyberattacks.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=first-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news|

[wasupaloopa]

1. So if we know are we going to sit around and be scared?

We can do something about it without trump.

[Amaryllis]

6. What do you recommend?

[YessirAtsaFact]

7. Disconnect the compromised plants from the internet

They should be able to run these plants offline

[roamer65]

10. Bingo!

[NurseJackie]

22. Wouldn't each nuclear plant ALSO need to send and receive updates/instructions/requests...

... to/from other entities along the grid infrastructure?

What kind of monitoring and data-exchange between plants and between substations and switching stations is needed for a smooth operation?

[FarCenter]

24. Yes, generation stations, switchyards, etc, need to communicate for "Smart Grid"

Communications and control networks are needed to manage electrical networks as an integrated system, especially for the "Smart Grid" needed to manage future green energy sources that vary with wind and sunlight and to manage the new loads such as electric car charging.

However, the communications and control networks need to be separated carefully from other networks, such as the internet. The individual components need to have well managed identifiers and cryptographic keys that allow communications only between legitimate sources and sinks of messages. Only the necessary protocols and application level formats should be permitted.

This is expensive and difficult, compared with just using the internet, but it is the only effective way to solve the problem.

I'm sort of surprised that it is not being done, since the FBI and other TLA folks have had programs with industry on critical infrastructure security since at least the early '90s.

[kstewart33]

12. The media should scream bloody murder immediately.

The Democrats assuredly will.

This is a real test of Trump's relationship with Putin. He must react strongly and immediately.

[Eliot Rosewater]

26. Sucks knowing that the president is a traitor and works for Putin.

Cant believe how we got here




familiar? Not you, but I recall seeing this shit a lot recently

[Zoonart]

29. n/t

[BigmanPigman]

2. I have heard that hacking the power grid, Dragonfly is the name,

on top of election hacking have been known to our govt for a little while yet no sanctions were imposed. The sanctions are a joke. A lot more needs to be done like extradition of the Russians on Mueller's list. Cyber attacks are Putin's new war on western democracies.

[Amaryllis]

9. I remember reading months ago that they had hacked the administrative side of the nuke power plants

but not the actual operational infrastructure, but that could be like they hacked the election, but it didn't affect vote totals; ya think?

[BigmanPigman]

13. Let's put it this way...

Do YOU trust Putin ??? I do not think he was ever an allie and has always been the enemy and is the most dangerous leader on the planet. He scares the shit out of me because he DOES NOT CARE about getting caught and/or punishments from other countries. He is the richest person on Earth and wants Russia to be the only world power and will do anything no matter how horrible to maintain his status and bring Russia back as a force to be feared by all the other western countries. He is pure evil.

[calimary]

14. And he has an asset in the White House now.

[AllyCat]

17. Interesting interview on BBC tonight with a Russian confidante that said even Putin is

A puppet to about 100 Russian citizens that can only be described as a gang of organized criminals.

[BigmanPigman]

20. Who are they?

Can't be the oligarchs. Are they like the mafia or the KGB or something else? What is their agenda and how do they control Putin?

[AllyCat]

21. I wish I could find the link to the interview

It was on world service last night but I missed the beginning of the interview. The man fears for his life. He says it is “organized crime” run by about 100 people. He says they “own” Putin.

[Eliot Rosewater]

27. Interesting to find out, what I already know without researching is SIXTY MILLION

American deplorables very much WANT a murderous dictator, racist, to rule over them.

Now I wonder how many of them use any kind of drug and I wonder what the no tolerance drug policy will do to them or their kids.





I cant be in the same species they are, I CANT

[Girard442]

3. Do we really have to control powerplants over the same net that carries kittycat pix and porn?

Seems like an inherently problematic design.

[FarCenter]

4. The solution is to isolate critical control systems from the Intenet.

There should be no communications path between a nuclear power plant control system and any undersea fiberoptic cable.

[Eliot Rosewater]

28. One other solution is to have a president who says to Putin, point blank:

"fuck with our power system and we will blow you off the fucking planet"


Filth like putin and his oligarchs wont understand anything else

[FarCenter]

33. Putin wouldn't believe it and we wouldn't actually mean it anyway.

Silly threats won't accomplish anything.

[Eliot Rosewater]

34. It is the EXACT threat we have made everyday since the 1950's. What are you talking bout.

Our nuclear program exists as a deterrent to the Russians, mainly.

The threat is known that we have them and could use them to defend our country.

Russia no longer fears us or our weapons, because of Trump.

[FarCenter]

36. The threat that we have made is "attack us with nukes, and we will attack back".

This is credible because a thermonuclear attack on an American city by even a single missile would result in at least 100s of thousands of dead Americans.

By comparison, a cyberattack on the power grid could range from shutting down some power lines or generation capacity to more serious attempts to create a cascading network failure like the Northeast Blackout of 2003. These are not casus belli for thermonuclear war. Particularly when the Russians would counter attack resulting in 10s of millions of US deaths.

It was the lack of scaleability of nuclear attacks that made Mutual Assured Destruction credible.

[zaj]

5. Um, just change the system? Shut their access off?

What am I missing?

If we know they can do it, we should be able to keep them from doing it.

[pangaia]

8. My question as well. Duh!

[dameatball]

31. I will spring for a circuit breaker if it will help.

[dweller]

11. this is currently on the Greatest page

https://www.democraticunderground.com/10142014333

linking to CERT's Technical Alert released today, which I read a bit of until it became too technical (programming, etc) and it is some scary stuff...

probably the greatest crisis looming (after global warming) ...

[C Moon]

15. I recall before our last (quote)ELECTION(unquote), there were several strange outages from hacking.

Practice makes perfect.

[sarcasmo]

16. First the election and now the power grid. We're at war and getting our A$$e$ whipped.

Vlad is laughing as Donnie plays golf

[Mme. Defarge]

18. Im calling it a room temperature war.

(You heard it here first.)

[spike91nz]

19. Nine tons of gold

Getting shipped in Russia seems coincidental with Trump appointig a gold standard zealot to manage the financial markets.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/mar/16/gold-silver-ingots-runway-falling-cargo-plane-russia

[Lee-Lee]

23. Most people dont grasp what a huge issue power grid security is.

Critical safety systems that control the actual reactors should be 100 air gapped and not hooked to the net. I can’t imagine DOE/NRC tolerating anything else.

However the rest of the grid- transformers, substations, switches is connected. And very vulnerable. Manipulation of that with nefarious intent could easily cause widespread loss of power that could run into weeks or months.

If you want to see the kind of hardships we have seen in Puerto Rico magnified x 1000, let the power drop across 1/3 of the US for a month.

[smirkymonkey]

25. What will Trump do??

Go golfing, of course.

That is the whole reason they installed him in the first place.

[workinclasszero]

30. Bingo

Its great for Putin to have his own personal traitor installed in the white house and the entire republican party/Fox 'news' etc running interference for him.

[duforsure]

32. This is what happens

When Putin installs a puppet in the White House. What's trump doing, nothing because he's compromised.

[Elwood P Dowd]

35. And then that puppet installs an ignorant fool, Rick Perry, as

Secretary of Energy. Then Perry hires a bunch of unqualified lobbyists and Trump groupies to run the place.