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Energy sector firms face physically damaging attacks
news/CALENDAR …Continued from front page Examples of companies refusing to pay up, such as Meetup.com, are few and far between. As such, hackers are increasingly confident they can hold businesses over a barrel, that they can execute crippling cyber-attacks and that most businesses would rather pay up than put up. There will be several high-profile examples of ransomware in 2016, and countless unreported incidents on top of that.” Other findings of the report are that the top barrier to stopping data loss in the cloud is a lack of skilled security professionals but that cloud confidence is rising – 64.9% of IT leaders think the cloud is as secure or more secure than on-premises software. The report is available here: www.skyhighnetworks.com/csa-report/. Not all cyber-extortionists get away with their crimes, however. Police raids in Europe, assisted by Scotland Yard, resulted in the arrest of an alleged member of the DD4BC gang. This cybercrime group was responsible for a number of ransom demands against companies that were subsequently taken offline with Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks if they didn’t pay up. The UK’s Metropolitan Police Cybercrime Unit (MPCCU) identified key members of the DD4BC group in Bosnia and Herzegovina. A Europolcoordinated operation, involving law enforcement agencies from Austria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Germany and the UK and associated activities in Australia, France, Japan, Romania, the US and Switzerland, culminated in the raids which led to the arrest of the main suspect and the detention of another. According to Europol, “an extensive amount of evidence was seized.”
Energy sector firms face physically damaging attacks
T
ripwire and Dimensional Research have published research on companies in the energy sector that shows a disconnect between executives and operational staff about the risks of
20
Network Security
cyber-attacks. It also highlighted an inability on the part of many of these firms to track threats to their operational technology.
According to the study, 82% of the respondents said a cyber-attack on the operational technology (OT) in their organisation could cause physical damage. However, only 70% of non-executives thought that this is the case compared to 100% of executives. When asked if their organisation has the ability to accurately track all the threats targeting their OT networks, 65% replied ‘no’. Additional findings from the study include: more than three out of four respondents (76%) believe their organisations are targets for cyber-attacks that could cause physical damage; and 78% said their organisations are potential targets for nation-state cyber-attacks. “The incredibly high percentages of these responses underscores the need for these industries to take material steps to improve cyber-security,” said Tim Erlin, director of IT security and risk strategy for Tripwire. “These threats are not going away. They are getting worse.” According to the Department of Homeland Security, the energy sector faces more cyber-attacks than any other industry, and attacks on industrial control system networks are on the rise. If successful, these energy sector cyber-attacks could have a dramatic physical impact. In December 2015, BlackEnergy malware was used in an attack against a power plant in the Ukraine and left over 700,000 customers without electricity. Erlin continued: “We’ve already seen the reality of these responses in the Ukraine mere months after this survey was completed. There can be no doubt that there is a physical safety risk from cyber-attacks targeting the energy industry today. While the situation may seem dire, in many cases there are well understood best practices that can be deployed to materially reduce the risk of successful cyber-attacks.” The report is available here: www.tripwire.com/company/research/ tripwire-2016-energy-survey-physicaldamage/.
Events Calendar 2–5 March 2016 NullCon
Goa, India http://nullcon.net/website/
9–11 March 2016
ACM Conference on Data and Application Security and Privacy New Orleans, LA, US www.codaspy.org/
10–11 March 2016 BSides SLC
Salt Lake City, UT, US www.bsidesslc.org
9 April 2016
BSides Oklahoma Tulsa, OK, US http://bit.ly/1O3pYZt
15–16 April 2016
BSides Canberra Canberra, Australia http://bit.ly/1l7suHc
2–4 May 2016
North America CACS New Orleans, US http://bit.ly/1Nqhu2c
23–27 May 2016 HITBSecConf
Amsterdam, Netherlands http://conference.hitb.org/
28–29 May 2016 LayerOne
Los Angeles, US www.layerone.org
30 May 2016
International Workshop on Traffic Measurements for Cyber-security Xi’an, China http://wtmc.info/
February 2016
Energy sector firms face physically damaging attacks
T
ripwire and Dimensional Research have published research on companies in the energy sector that shows a disconnect between executives and operational staff about the risks of
20
Network Security
cyber-attacks. It also highlighted an inability on the part of many of these firms to track threats to their operational technology.
According to the study, 82% of the respondents said a cyber-attack on the operational technology (OT) in their organisation could cause physical damage. However, only 70% of non-executives thought that this is the case compared to 100% of executives. When asked if their organisation has the ability to accurately track all the threats targeting their OT networks, 65% replied ‘no’. Additional findings from the study include: more than three out of four respondents (76%) believe their organisations are targets for cyber-attacks that could cause physical damage; and 78% said their organisations are potential targets for nation-state cyber-attacks. “The incredibly high percentages of these responses underscores the need for these industries to take material steps to improve cyber-security,” said Tim Erlin, director of IT security and risk strategy for Tripwire. “These threats are not going away. They are getting worse.” According to the Department of Homeland Security, the energy sector faces more cyber-attacks than any other industry, and attacks on industrial control system networks are on the rise. If successful, these energy sector cyber-attacks could have a dramatic physical impact. In December 2015, BlackEnergy malware was used in an attack against a power plant in the Ukraine and left over 700,000 customers without electricity. Erlin continued: “We’ve already seen the reality of these responses in the Ukraine mere months after this survey was completed. There can be no doubt that there is a physical safety risk from cyber-attacks targeting the energy industry today. While the situation may seem dire, in many cases there are well understood best practices that can be deployed to materially reduce the risk of successful cyber-attacks.” The report is available here: www.tripwire.com/company/research/ tripwire-2016-energy-survey-physicaldamage/.
Events Calendar 2–5 March 2016 NullCon
Goa, India http://nullcon.net/website/
9–11 March 2016
ACM Conference on Data and Application Security and Privacy New Orleans, LA, US www.codaspy.org/
10–11 March 2016 BSides SLC
Salt Lake City, UT, US www.bsidesslc.org
9 April 2016
BSides Oklahoma Tulsa, OK, US http://bit.ly/1O3pYZt
15–16 April 2016
BSides Canberra Canberra, Australia http://bit.ly/1l7suHc
2–4 May 2016
North America CACS New Orleans, US http://bit.ly/1Nqhu2c
23–27 May 2016 HITBSecConf
Amsterdam, Netherlands http://conference.hitb.org/
28–29 May 2016 LayerOne
Los Angeles, US www.layerone.org
30 May 2016
International Workshop on Traffic Measurements for Cyber-security Xi’an, China http://wtmc.info/
February 2016