WASHINGTON, Oct. 17, 2007
Cyberthreats Rising Against Electric Grid
GAO: Homeland Security Isn’t Doing Enough To Protect Critical Power Facilities
-
Play CBS Video Video Internet Vulnerability A new government investigation warns that Internet hackers pose a threat to the nation's power grids, transit systems, pipelines and water plants. Bob Orr reports.
-
(CBS)
-
Interactive Electricity: Powering America Cost charts, power consumption in the home, average monthly electric bills and more.
Private industry and government are paying more attention to cybersecurity. But the Government Accountability Office said control systems at such critical facilities “are more vulnerable (today) to cyberattacks than in the past.”
A number of key systems have already been infiltrated, reports CBS News correspondent Bob Orr:
Among the reasons are the extensive use of the Internet and the systems' links.
Greg Wilshusen, the agency's director of information security issues, told a House Homeland Security subcommittee Wednesday that the government has improved the security of power lines, nuclear plants, refineries and power stations.Read the GAO's full report here.
Yet, he added, “there is yet no overall strategy to coordinate the various activities across federal agencies and the private sector.”
The agency and several lawmakers said the Homeland Security Department is not doing enough to spread word about adequate standards for cybersecurity and threat information.
"Since 9/11, we've had a great deal of emphasis on gates, guns, and guards,” said CBS News security consultant Paul Kurtz, “and cyber security has been, frankly, neglected."
“The cyber-risk to these systems is increasing,” agreed Rep. James Langevin, chairman of the subcommittee on emerging threats, cybersecurity and science and technology. “If this administration doesn't recognize and prioritize these problems soon, the future isn't going to be pretty.”
Langevin, D-R.I., noted the recent disclosure that government scientists at the Energy Department's Idaho National Laboratory were able to hack into a simulated power plant control system and cause an electric generator to destruct.
While the test was conducted on a small-scale system, experts said it showed that a similar attack potentially could disable huge generators and other equipment essential to power production.
But Texas Rep. Michael McCaul, the subcommittee's top Republican, said the simulated attack last March was “a good news story” because it disclosed vulnerabilities. He said changes and improvements were made to reduce the risk. “We found it. ... We fixed it,” McCaul said.
Quote
Greg Garcia, assistant secretary for cybersecurity, told lawmakers that “we've known for some time that there are (cyber) vulnerabilities.” He said Homeland Security is working with other agencies on standards and guidance to protect critical control systems.Since 9/11, we've had a great deal of emphasis on gates, guns, and guards, and cyber security has been, frankly, neglected.
CBS News security consultant Paul KurtzRep. Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif., pressed Garcia on what the department is doing to get more stringent standards to industry. Garcia said issuing such standards was a job for the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.
“Our role is one of coordination,” he said.
Lofgren said that was not the intent of Congress when it created the department. “We haven't made any progress in the cybersecurity side for a long, long time,” she said.
The commission is considering more stringent standards for the electricity industry that a quasi-industry group, the North American Electric Reliability Corp., is developing.
Joe Weiss, a cybersecurity consultant, said private industry should have to comply with tougher standards that already apply to the government's critical infrastructure.
But David Whiteley, the group's executive vice president, said its proposed standards “represent a significant improvement of cybersecurity for the electricity industry.”
© MMVII, CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.
More From SciTech
Add a Comment See all 13 Comments
- The time is coming when each will have to fend for his/ her self and their family. When that time arrives you had better be able to defend, house, clothe and feed yourself and your family without assistance from anyone else because no one else will help you.
Some of us are prepared for this time. We grow our own food, we hunt the creatures of the forest, we catch the fish from the river and we preserve what isn''t needed immediately for use later. Don''t rely on the power grid to run your freezer, refrigerator etc. Canning in jars is much more reliable and can be done over an open fire.
This is why we have to preserve the right to keep and bear arms. - Reply to this comment
'' ...
imagine shoving trillions of dollars
of drugs
down kids throats,
imagine waving trillions of dollars
of guns
in kids faces,
imagine all the people
sharing all the world,
i hope some day you''ll join us
and the world will live as one,
... ''- Reply to this comment
- '' .. as long as the wealthy and entreprenuerial classes fail to provide for the needs of the more poor and less skilled classes: the more poor less skilled classes will tend to compete for resources, thereby utilizing and wasting far more resources than are required or even desired .. if, however, the needs of the more poor less skilled classes are met, then they will be satisfied to tend to settle for far less and to wait out want based shortages, thereby freeing up resources for the wealthy and skilled classes ... it is exactly that people tend to utilize hapazzard and extravagant amounts of food and land and medicine because they are not allowed reasonable amounts of free food and land and medicine .. why invest money and votes in guns to keep folk reminded that most folk most time do not invest money and votes in guns that remind folk most folk most time do not invest money and votes in guns .. ''
'' .. they''ve got trillions in nuclear biological chemical stealth raype arsenals, but spend most of their time educating and disciplining ignorant naive children so the kids don''t get hurt by a world that invests trillions into educating and disciplining ignorant naive children with nuclear biological chemical stealth raype arsenals .. ''
'' .. the pharoah got so rich, that her tinyest most worthless piece of garbage did far more than feed all forever, and then she forgot all about how rich she was and whined of her poverty, ignorance, and mortality .. for a shortest while anyway .. '' - Reply to this comment
- Six long years after 911, Bush still flounders with the mission he was assigned by the American people, in congress assembled. Rather than find bin Laden, and prosecute the so-called "War on Terror", Bush and Cheney have squandered both opportunity and a huge public funding, with little but a disastrous war to show for it.
A GAO investigation now reveals Bush has pulled a Katrina-scale failure of due diligence at the Department of Homeland Security. As its report says "... there is as yet no overall strategy to coordinate the various activities across federal agencies and the private sector. Further, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) lacks processes needed to address specific weaknesses in sharing information on control system vulnerabilities."
What has the DHS been doing? While we still should worry about an attack on a prominent public landmark like the World Trade Center of New York City, the newer mode of attack is far more damaging. Characteristically, however, Bush has been out to lunch.
Now, we understand what has kept Bush and Ceney busy.
(see next Department of Homeland Security--2) - Reply to this comment
Department of Homeland Security-- 2
Unwilling to confront their monumental failures across the entire national security front, Bush and Cheney instead have tried to distract the public with a battle with congress. Bush and Cheney have made constitutionally unwarranted claims about the powers of the presidency not seen since the days of Richard Nixon. When Bush first made these claims, he barely avoided a mass exodus in protest by DOJ officials, and a crisis over executive misbehavior surely will mark his final year in office.
A basic requirement of presidential power is the oath to "execute faithfully the laws of the United States". Instead of carrying out the will of the people in congress, however, Bush and Cheney say they have the power to defy congress. Bush and his hundreds of signing statements leave a paper trial which is superb grounds for impeachment.
Bush once confided he understands the advantage of a dictatorship, but the urgent question is whether he understands the rule of constitutional law. Bush is the individual who, in November, 2005, facing an assembly of party members critical of his NSA spying program, bristled like a teenager caught drinking after curfew-- "Stop throwing the Constitution in my face! It''s just a GD)((#@*! piece of paper!"
Is this figure, who claims to be president of the United States, the same who pledged an oath to "protect, preserve and defend" the document he calls a "GD)((#@*! piece of paper"?- Reply to this comment
- You got civil service workers and their contractors running the country. What did you expect?
- Reply to this comment
- blackout, britney spears new cd/album is most prophetic.
many seers are magicians and musicians, they
always have something up their sleeve. they
can pull rabbits out of a magic hat. for real.
its amazing. some think they used marked cards.
not true. they are the golden geese. and the
easter bunnies who hunt the eggs, pure gold ones.
blackouts were predicted for this time period
back in the 1950''s. every now and then in school
we''d be taken into our future. to guestimate
what it would be like, and to prepare for its
problems. it is black out tonite. its dark mostly.
do they want black to get out? why is space black?
there is no melanin in it? why is the term negro
given to the negroid race? what is called in
other languages. negro means black in spanish.
it refers to their noses, they get more oxygen
than white people, which makes them better runners.
for example in basketball. their respiratory
system is generally better. but nowadays that
might be construed as rascist, in a oversensitized
society. that was done with sensitivity training.
and encounter groups. all part of the bolshevik
advance troops. one way to destroy a mind.
joe snidegrass yahoo 360. those bolsheviks keep
pecking away. mother hen, mother russia. thanks
for the chicken feed. - Reply to this comment
- To most of us this is more frightening, mostly misunderstood consequences of a more cautious society hovering under some vague ''big brother/ette'' syndrome. It''s forboding and ominous at best.
- Reply to this comment
- not two weeks ago it was widely broadcast that electrical grids were vunerable; It''s been said that the U.S. government had no imagination when it comes to terror threats, I propose neither do the cyper nuts. Don''t give people ideas you idiots...
- Reply to this comment
- What a joke, you don''t want computers compromised by internet intrusion? Don''t hook them up to the internet DUH. There really is no need unless you are trying to save money by running important, mission critical apparatus with too few people. Yeah you can save money by having way less people watching important things as they happen, but *** guys the internet is not safe, never was, never will be. Well up a smoothwall and seperate the internet from the intranet and pray, or hire back those things called people you layed off in hope of saving money. BTW think the lawsuits that will come will even out the money you saved in the short run fools?
Cart - Reply to this comment
Author Thomas Friedman on Obama's Afghanistan plan and the war on terror.
