Iran: ‘U.S. Power Grid Prime Target for Cyber Attack’
On April 16, the head of Iranian cyberwarfare within Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, Gholam Reza Jalali, officially blamed the U.S. and Israel for Stuxnet — a mysterious computer worm that has harmed Iran’s nuclear program. The Guard’s officials have repeatedly warned of retaliation: both for the assassinations of the Iranian nuclear scientists inside Iran, which they called acts of espionage, and for Stuxnet.
Reports from Iran indicate that during a recent meeting among Iran’s Revolutionary Guard commanders and Iranian scientists, America’s vulnerabilities for a cyber attack were discussed. They concluded that the U.S. power grids represent the best opportunity for such attacks, as more U.S. utilities are moving their control systems to the Internet and using smart-grid technology.
The Iranian leaders have acknowledged Stuxnet hit a limited number of centrifuges at both its main uranium enrichment facility in Natanz and its nuclear power plant in Bushehr. Although the Iranians quickly replaced the defective centrifuges at Natanz and have steadily enriched uranium to a holding of over 8000 pounds (enough for three nuclear bombs), they have not been able to recover as fast at the Bushehr nuclear power plant. Rejoining the country’s power grid has been delayed several times.
It was reported last month that the Iranian cyber warfare program was moved under the supervision of the Passive Defense Organization of Iran. The European Union lists this as an entity linked to either Iran’s proliferation-sensitive nuclear activities or Iran’s development of nuclear weapon delivery systems.
A recent report by the U.S. Department of Energy’s Inspector General found that the nation’s power grid is still prone to a cyber attack. The vulnerable state of the power grid was blamed on several different factors, especially the fact that the “critical infrastructure protection” (CIP) cyber standards, which power companies were to have fully implemented a year ago, are not effective.
Other reports within the U.S. have concluded that cyber spies have penetrated the U.S. electrical grid and left behind software programs that could be used to disrupt the system. It is also believed that the Chinese have attempted to map the U.S. infrastructure, including the electrical grid.
While China has little incentive to disrupt the U.S. economy, the Iranian leaders see it as an opportunity to further weaken U.S. supremacy. A successful cyber attack on the North American power grid could disrupt the economy and possibly create a national trauma.
Iran’s cyber warfare unit is now actively recruiting hackers from around the world for what they promote as the goals of the Islamic Republic.
This is bad. We have known for years that our power grid is vulnerable to all kinds of threats. The worst one could be an Electro-Magnetic Pulse (EMP) missile exploded over the United States or a section of the country. That could destroy anything with an electronic chip or anything that produces electricity. It would be a disaster to the United States and many, many, people would die due to lack of food and electrical services since it would take years to repair the damage caused by such an attack. An attack like this would also probably trigger a nuclear war, with the United States attacking Iran with everything it had. Although Iran would be destroyed, America would certainly be vulnerable to attack from other nations, such as China.
This should be taken very, very, seriously and if Iran really is thinking about doing this, it IS an act of war and they need to be stopped immediately. If not, the United States could face a horror it has never, ever, experienced and one I don’t really think it could recover from.
Back during the Cold War, Herman Kahn thought about the unthinkable,
and one of his conclusions was that the US could lose up to 25% of
its population in a thermonuclear war, survive, and recover;
Anything over that, and whatever rose up out of the ashes would not
be the US of A.
First you have to have a PRESIDENT who wants America to win and is willing to fight, likely Obama would just do nothing….
If Iran were to do this it would be the end of the Mullahs.
We have ignored Iranian belicosity for over 30 years now. I agree with Libertyship 46 above, such an attack is an act of war. It would be the excuse we need to destroy their command and control and wreak havoc upon these murderers who have gone unpunished for the barracks bombing of 1983 and the deaths of several thousand US soldiers in Iraq.
If Iran were to launch a cyber atttack they need to know that our response would be highly disporportional and that one way or another we would completely defeat them and take their country as a prize of war.
They need to made an example for the rest of our enemies to witness. The Persians are a threat to world security, if they attack us it needs to be their last attack.
We would do nothing and you know it.
“OBAMA would do nothing and you know it.”
FTFY
If their last attack causes the return of the 12th Imam,
they do not care what else happens.
Thanks for pointing out the obvious. The United Stated power grid is vulnerable. This is nothing new. I’m glad that Iran is just now figuring this out.
In this era of global tension, and technology, some grown ups are needed. I have engineered a score of nukes and two score of fossil power plants, and have assessed advanced technology for more than a decade. I know there are people in our government whose rich bowl depends on a wide spread fear that some boogie man can use a lap top and melt our grid. It is almost pure nonsense. Power plants are designed so that nothing outside can ruin millions of dollars of investment. If anything bad occurs, they simply disconnect from the world and stop. When things are OK, they start back up. It is true that some teenage hacker, from some remote location, could transmit unstable programming which would trip a plant. If dozens of plants were tripping, this alone would collapse the grid, shut everything down, perhaps for a day. This would be both a disaster, and an act of war, as noted above. Thank God for grown ups. America has ways to deal with war.
America’s problem is that our energy policies may collapse our creaky grid, with no external enemy. The load is getting much bigger than the supply, and it has been impossible to build large new generating facilities for decades. The machines that power your monitor were build in the 1950s-60s; they are worn out.
Our grid will collapse when some plant engineer gets tried of working all weekend, for free, trying to keep broken equipment running, and gives up. If enough plants tear up, the grid will go down for years. When that occurs, Tehran should not be the target. Our main problem lies along the banks of the Potomac river.
All that is generally true, but without rigorous audits, it’s amazing how easy it is for some idiot in operations to connect a plant computer to the office LAN, and inadvertently to the internet. And since most of the SCADA packages run under Microsoft Windows, the barn door’s wide open.
STUXNET-like attacks on the control hardware requires a level of sophistication above and beyond your typical hacker, and I doubt that the Iranians have that kind of sophistication, but we shouldn’t be tempting fate, either.
I do believe that EPRI, IEEE and others are studying the problem, but the first step: get rid of all Microsoft-based control equipment. Mac and Linux aren’t much better. There are secure OSes made specifically for this kind of dedicated purpose, and they cost thousands of dollars per copy, but that’s the only way to keep the evil spirits out.
Thank you for your comment.
This seems to be the general opinion of those who do the O&M
on our infrastructure; TPTB have not only failed to maintain
it, but actually _reduced_ the resiliency of the systems, so
they could spend the ‘savings’ elsewhere, with bad results
such as the Gulf oil spill, and before that the NOLA flood.
I have read the coments that have been left, and, not wanting to ‘stir up fear’, I would like to make a point or two. I don’t think that Iran really cares about the ramifications of any act or acts that it has perpetrated or is considering. This is clear in its refusal to comply with U.N. demands to cease its nuclear war proliferation programs, to which we all see the ineffectiveness of these types of resolutions. They, (Iran) just do not care what the rest of the world thinks, and they will continue with their agenda,whatever the cost in embargos. The country will get what they need from other sources, who, by the way, are either allies or supposed friends of the U.S., as they have been doing since the sanctions and embargos began. The bottom line is this: We should be prepared against any threat, from any country. If our leadership does not or will not secure this Nation, then any other efforts will be lacking. I think that the Middle East smells this, and they will take full advantage when they are able.
I hope they do try. This would be exactly what we need. As noted, the interruption would likely be both local and brief. However, it would stir up some sentiment around here since it hits us where we live – so to speak. I worked in power plants years ago, I know about the tripping, and the control systems. However, there are many more possibilities for wider ranging damage. Even at that, with many plants running well beyond their design life, and efficiencies so low, it would almost be a favor to us to have something worthwhile to spend our stimulus money on. The national rage would be the “terrorism dividend” that we and our opponents would then both reap.
9/11 got us the Patriot act; Do you really want to live under
the sort of authoritarian administration that would certainly
take power after a successful, large scale, high casualty hit
on our power grid ?
Really, just a half a dozen guys with rifles and it is done. You can cook on an open fire after that.
Re to Larry.R. The Iranians can always buy or lend/lease the hackers from Russia & China, they will be paying with our oil money=We are funding them!
WWIII has already begun! You just can see it, open your eyes folks!
It will be too late when there will be a 200 million strong Chinese Army marching towards Africa to grab the natural resources which are located there…
Ahmedinejad=Antichrist
Obama=False prophet
You figure out the rest!
God bless you all and have a Happy Easter
Bacon…. Bacon Bacon Bacon!
I think that the Obama administration needs a blue ribbon panel to look into this
There are many pages of dry and technical testimony about the effects of an EMP strike against the US. For a bit more “people oriented” approach, read “One Second After” by William Forstchen. GBUSA
The guy Reza Kahlili they mention in the subtext is actually going to be on a radio show on the internet on Wednesday the 29th. Everyone should take a listen. He should be talking about what he went through/experienced and what Iran’s plans are and how we can prepare. Here’s the link: http://www.blogtalkradio.com/empact-radio/2011/06/29/pvp55–reza-kahlili-author-of-a-time-to-betray Should be good.