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WaPo: Russian government hackers hacked into U.S.nuclear power companies.

K

KSweeley

Member
Link: https://www.washingtonpost.com/worl...-fea80e32bf47_story.html?wpisrc=nl_amk&wpmm=1

July 8, 2017

Russian government hackers were behind recent cyber-intrusions into the business systems of U.S. nuclear power and other energy companies in what appears to be an effort to assess their networks, according to U.S. government officials.

The U.S. officials said there is no evidence the hackers breached or disrupted the core systems controlling operations at the plants, so the public was not at risk. Rather, they said, the hackers broke into systems dealing with business and administrative tasks, such as personnel.

At the end of June, the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security sent a joint alert to the energy sector stating that “advanced, persistent threat actors” — a euphemism for sophisticated foreign hackers — were stealing network log-in and password information to gain a foothold in company networks. The agencies did not name Russia.

The campaign marks the first time Russian government hackers are known to have wormed their way into the networks of American nuclear power companies, several U.S. and industry officials said. And the penetration could be a sign that Russia is seeking to lay the groundwork for more damaging hacks.

The National Security Agency has detected specific activity by the Russian spy agency, the FSB, targeting the energy firms, according to two officials. The NSA declined to comment. The intrusions have been previously reported but not the attribution to Russia by U.S. officials.
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V

Valhelm

contribute something
Not surprising at all. The Russian government depends on the success of its native energy sector, so they're in desperate need of foreign trade secrets. It also doesn't help that the energy industry in all countries is unbelievably cutthroat.

I don't think anybody ever got to the bottom of the 2013 Metcalf raid. Shit was straight out of a Splinter Cell game.
 
S

shem935

Banned
Well thank goodness we're going to be getting help from Vlad to secure our cyber, who knows who caused this attack.
 
K

KernelPanic

Member
Trial run

https://www.google.ca/amp/s/www.wired.com/story/crash-override-malware/amp

At midnight, a week before last Christmas, hackers struck an electric transmission station north of the city of Kiev, blacking out a portion of the Ukrainian capital equivalent to a fifth of its total power capacity. The outage lasted about an hour---hardly a catastrophe. But now cybersecurity researchers have found disturbing evidence that the blackout may have only been a dry run. The hackers appear to have been testing the most evolved specimen of grid-sabotaging malware ever observed in the wild.
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P

Pop-O-Matic

Banned
cuckchick.jpg
 
D

Daedardus

Member
The power plant themselves run completely on their own special network though and there's no hook to connect something to it. So it's more about corporate espionage rather than safety threats.
 
P

Ponn

Banned
The joint Cyber Security Coalition with Russia will get to the bottom of this. Trump has the best Americans working with Russia headed by his own son Barron who is well versed in cyber.
 
C

Concept17

Member
Did they ever find out the source behind the attacks a few weeks before the election when all the major websites went down and most the west and east coasts lost internet?
 
P

PabloBolivar

Banned
Excuse my skeptisism, but how long until the WaPo has to retract this story like that power grid story? That was really embarrassing.
 
O

op_ivy

Fallen Xbot (cannot continue gaining levels in this class)
Who needs enemies with friends like these? The best of friends
 
C

Common Knowledge

Member
Trump: Putin, did you guys hack into our nuclear power companies?

Putin: No, we did not.

Trump: Ok, I believe you. Want to work together on building our nuclear defenses?
 
A

Adam_Vania

Banned
a euphemism for sophisticated foreign hackers — were stealing network log-in and password information to gain a foothold in company networks. The agencies did not name Russia

so they were given a euphamism and not told that it was actually Russia but the WaPo Russia story factory needed something to churn out so here we go let's all play detective spy
 
S

Shauni

Member
Adam_Vania said:
a euphemism for sophisticated foreign hackers — were stealing network log-in and password information to gain a foothold in company networks. The agencies did not name Russia

so they were given a euphamism and not told that it was actually Russia but the WaPo Russia story factory needed something to churn out so here we go let's all play detective spy
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So quick to a hot take you couldn't even finish the OP, huh?
 
S

sc0la

Unconfirmed Member
Adam_Vania said:
a euphemism for sophisticated foreign hackers — were stealing network log-in and password information to gain a foothold in company networks. The agencies did not name Russia

so they were given a euphamism and not told that it was actually Russia but the WaPo Russia story factory needed something to churn out so here we go let's all play detective spy
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It's not really a euphemism, APT is an industry term for highly sophisticated cyber threat groups, they almost always, but not exclusively, have state backing or are part of the state's cyber ops.
 
A

akira28

Member
well that's why we have the deep state layer cake. they can hack our nuclear power companies but they will never hack our freedom...ok maybe they will hack our freedom but they will never hack our capitalism.
 
B

Biske

Member
I just hope we can work with Russia to figure out how to stop them from fucking us over.






I hate this fucking country. It's more and more dumb by the day.
 
B

Boney

Banned
PabloBolivar said:
Excuse my skeptisism, but how long until the WaPo has to retract this story like that power grid story? That was really embarrassing.
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You're not supposed to be skeptical here.

You have the WP running bizarre and unethical stories like Prop or Not and there's the FBI trying to link standing rock activists as terrorists and planting bogus stories about the camps. But whatever, it might impeach trump so let's beat the war drums
 
Theonik

Theonik

Member
It was just Putin holding his word of helping the US with cyber.
It's just penetration testing nothing to see here.
 
R

riotous

Banned
PabloBolivar said:
Excuse my skeptisism, but how long until the WaPo has to retract this story like that power grid story? That was really embarrassing.
Click to expand...

Yeah I had the same reaction.

Feel like Maddow's warning needs to be headed for sure by the media; there will be attempts to frame Russia for things that turn out to be false. And right wing media will magically get the leads on those stories.
 
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