One of the most terrifying questions to mull over concerning emergency situations is what you would do if there was some sort of cyberattack on the power grid and you were without electricity for an extended period of time. While this is an uncomfortable thought to think through, you might want to consider doing just that, because a number of experts are issuing warnings that it’s only a matter of time before there is a successful cyberattack on a power grid.
Foreign individuals and government entities are already trying to do just that. According to the End Of The American Dream‘s latest post, we’ll be taking a look at how very vulnerable our infrastructure really is and just how hard China and Russia is working to ensure that they have the technological capabilities to wage cyberwarfare.
If, God forbid, there should ever be some sort of war between the United States and China or Russia, you can guarantee our power grid will be targeted. Does your local community have a plan in place for such an emergency?
The U.S. and Canada are not covered under a single grid, but several that are partnered together to provide electric power to all whom need it. Check out more information on that below:
The electrical power grid that powers Northern America is not a single grid, but is instead divided into multiple wide area synchronous grids.[1] The Eastern Interconnection and the Western Interconnection are the largest. Three other regions include the Texas Interconnection, the Quebec Interconnection, and the Alaska Interconnection. Each region delivers power at a nominal 60 Hz frequency. The regions are not usually directly connected or synchronized to each other, but there exist some HVDCinterconnectors. The Eastern and Western grids are connected via seven links that allow 1.32 GW to flow between them. A study by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory found that increasing these interconnections would save energy costs.[2]
Bloomber stated in a recent report that the power grids in our nation are now looking straight down the barrel of the proverbial gun at heightened risks of both cyber and physical attacks as the 2024 presidential election draws near. One expert in the field are now warning that bits and pieces of critical infrastructure will be breached at some point in the future.
“I think there’s a 100 percent chance that organizations in the critical infrastructure space at some point will experience some short of breach,” said Stephanie Benoit Kurtz, lead cybersecurity faculty at the College of Business and Information Technology at the University of Phoenix. “No longer are the days when organizations can say, ‘We’ll never be breached.’ It’s not if, it’s when.”
The EOTAD author of the piece noted that he is in agreement with her. One of the biggest mistakes we ever made was exposing our power grids to the Internet, which has opened up a huge realm of possible vulnerabilities. FBI Director Christopher Wray stated during a congressional hearing that hackers in China have been trying to take out our power grids:
FBI Director Christopher Wray said Wednesday that China’s hackers are targeting American critical infrastructure, including water treatment plants, pipelines and the power grid, to be able to “wreak havoc” in the U.S. if Beijing ever decides to do so.
Testifying before the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party, Wray also warned that there has been too little public attention on the threat that he says China’s efforts pose to national security.
“China’s hackers are positioning on American infrastructure in preparation to wreak havoc and cause real-world harm to American citizens and communities, if and when China decides the time has come to strike,” Wray told lawmakers.
When China decides to invade Taiwan, you can almost guarantee we’ll be at war with China. That’s almost a guarantee.
The Office of the Director of National Intelligence issued a warning, saying, “if Beijing feared that a major conflict with the United States were imminent, it almost certainly would consider undertaking aggressive cyber operations against U.S. homeland critical infrastructure and military assets worldwide.”
In August of 2023, hackers launched a targeted attack against the power grid in Texas.
The report says that, in August, hackers attempted to access the computer systems used by the Public Utility Commission of Texas, or the PUC, and the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, or ERCOT, which operate the state’s power grid. Most of Texas is on its own power grid, separate from the grids used by most of the country.
If you think our system is reliably secure and isn’t vulnerable, well, I hate to tell you, but you’re wrong. Like really wrong.
U.S. power grids are increasingly vulnerable to cyberattacks, with the number of susceptible points in electrical networks increasing by about 60 per day, the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) said in a webcast on Thursday.
The grids’ virtual and physical weak spots, or points in software or hardware that are susceptible to cyber criminals, grew to a range of 23,000 to 24,000 last year from 21,000 to 22,000 by the end of 2022, executives with the energy regulator said.
“It’s very hard to keep pace with addressing all those vulnerabilities,” said Manny Cancel, senior vice president of NERC.
What’s really scary is that these countries might already have a back door in place, giving them the opportunity to get into the grid without breaking a sweat.
According to one analysis, “about 90 percent of software used to manage the U.S. power grid is linked to Russian and Chinese developers”…
Orlando based Fortress Information Security explained that any “kid” with internet can contribute their “block” that then can be developed into software used in America’s critical infrastructure. A “block”, one of these code components, can risk the whole structure– our energy grid.
“A Chinese agent or a Russian agent can install backdoors into one of these components. And then unbeknownst to a software manufacturer, you grab this component, which has been tampered with and poisoned by Russian or Chinese actor and now they put that component into their software, and it ends up in our electrical grid or, or an oil rig,” said Alex Santos, CEO of Fortress Information Security.
The company analyzed nearly 8,000 of these open-source components. 13 percent had contributions from Russia and China. Fortress found about 90 percent of software used to manage the U.S. power grid is linked to Russian and Chinese developers—something that can make it three times as likely to contain critical vulnerabilities.
One of the reasons this is so bad is that if the power goes out for an extended period, all of life comes to a grinding halt. Lights are out. No more sewage treatment. No clean water. No electric cars. Elevators no longer work, older people and the disabled get trapped. No way to preserve food. No heat. Things get bad real quick.
Prepare, folks. Prepare.
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