On Wednesday, the U.K. government’s cyber defense agency warned of a growing threat to Western essential national infrastructure from hackers sympathetic to Russia’s war on Ukraine.
Russia-aligned “hacktivists” have vandalized or taken down public websites in innocuous internet campaigns. However, in a notice, Britain’s National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC), part of the GCHQ eavesdropping spy agency, warned that some organizations were actively plotting additional real-world damage.
“Some have stated a desire to achieve a more disruptive and destructive impact against western critical national infrastructure, including the U.K.,” the NCSC added.
“We expect these groups to look for opportunities to create such an impact, particularly if systems are poorly protected,” said the notice, published to journalists at a two-day NCSC-GCHQ conference in Belfast.
“Not subject to formal state control,” the advisory stated; such organizations are ideologically driven and support Russian state aims.
It said, “This makes them less predictable.”
An electricity grid or water supply cyberattack may be devastating.
Hacktivist groups are “unlikely” to carry out such assaults “without external assistance,” but they “may become more effective over time,” according to the NCSC alert.
That aid may already exist.
One “Top Secret” U.S. intelligence document revealed online recently warned that a pro-Russia hacker organization called “Zarya” had hacked Canada’s gas infrastructure networks.
The group showed Russia’s FSB screenshots showing their ability to “increase valve pressure, disable alarms, and initiate an emergency shutdown of an unspecified gas distribution station,” according to the “Top Secret” document Reuters obtained.
Reuters hasn’t confirmed the documents. However, Britain stated there was “a serious level of inaccuracy” in the documents.
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