Hackers have infiltrated the critical safety systems for industrial control units used in nuclear, oil and gas plants

Photo Credit : Reuters,

It is being reported that, according to security company, FireEye, hackers have infiltrated the critical safety systems for industrial control units used in nuclear, oil and gas plants, halting operations at at least one facility.

Gary McGraw, VP of Security Technology, Synopsys, said: "When everything is connected to the Internet, including industrial control systems, cars and trucks, and banks, we should not be surprised with the connected things become potential targets. War has long since moved onto the Internet just like everything else.  

"Physically destroying a target’s infrastructure in future wars may be just as much a matter of logic bombs in software as it is about exploding missiles made of metal.  You can bet that nation-states are doing whatever they can to get a leg up on potential enemy targets, including probing safety instrumented systems (SIS). In this case, the SIS apparently tripped a shutdown while attackers were probing and doing other system reconnaissance. The attackers did not set out to get caught.

"Software has been a target of attack for decades.  We should not be surprised that infrastructure software in safety critical systems is a target.  The TRITON attack serves as an important wake up call for those continuing to hit the cyber snooze button."

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