Hacking the Lights Out
ITI Director and TCIPG researcher, David M. Nicol, wrote an article recently published in Scientific American (July 2011) that focuses on cybersecurity for electrical power grids, recent threats, and current strategies for enhacing power grid security.
From the article …
“Every facet of the modern electrical grid is controlled by computers. It is our greatest example of physical infrastructure interlinked with electronics. The Stuxnet virus that infected Iran’s nuclear program showed just how vulnerable machines could be to a well-crafted electronic virus. The grid shares many of the vulnerabilities that Stuxnet exposed; being larger, its vulnerabilities are, if anything, more numerous. Although a sophisticated attack could bring down a large chunk of the U.S. electrical grid, security is being ramped up.”