Cyberattack on US Oil Pipeline Infrastructure

Husky_Khan

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Biden stated that they believe the Hackers are based in Russia but that the Russian government was not involved.

The Hill said:
“We do not believe the Russian government was involved in this attack, but we do have strong reason to believe that the criminals who did the attack are living in Russia, that’s where it came from,” Biden said, citing findings from the FBI.

“We have been in direct communication with Moscow about the imperative for responsible countries to take decisive action against ransomware networks,” he noted. “We are also going to pursue a measure to disrupt their ability to operate.”

Asked directly if he was confident Russian President Vladimir Putin was not involved, Biden emphasized that the FBI did not believe Putin was involved.

Biden said he would likely discuss the attack with Putin at some point.

“We are working to try to get to the place where we have an international standard that governments knowing that criminal activities are happening in their territory, that we all move on those criminal enterprises, and I expect that is one of the topics I will be talking about with President Putin,” Biden said.

 

Bassoe

Well-known member
No, because first, that's a ton more expensive.
Wilykit said it'd be safer, not cheaper. Which is true, manual airgaps are a useful deterrent but they cost more, either directly by meaning you've got to pay a human employee or indirectly, by slowing things from the speed of pure computers by having a human in the decision loop, meaning inability to compete on equal terms with rivals who don't use such safety measures.

Avernus said:
 

PsihoKekec

Swashbuckling Accountant
Too much of a hassle for corporations to set up. Big line must go up, so costs for security must go down.
 

Abhorsen

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Idiots... You never pay the ransom because then it tells others you will pay and creates a reason for them to attack you...
Eh, in this case it makes sense given how critical they are, and how well defended they are. It was apparently hard to actually find the way in. Just properly airgap the security cameras from the rest.
 

Husky_Khan

The Dog Whistler... I mean Whisperer.
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It's reported that an as of yet unidentified government has took down the 'public' side of Darksides Ransomware affiliate operations including its victim shaming blog where it releases the information of targets that don't pay up, as well as seizing their servers that also deal with Ddos attacks and payment processing.

According to their hosting support all that is known is that it was done on behalf of 'law enforcement.'

Also their largely crypto based funds had been drained from their accounts by an unknown group as well.

 

Terthna

Professional Lurker
It's reported that an as of yet unidentified government has took down the 'public' side of Darksides Ransomware affiliate operations including its victim shaming blog where it releases the information of targets that don't pay up, as well as seizing their servers that also deal with Ddos attacks and payment processing.

According to their hosting support all that is known is that it was done on behalf of 'law enforcement.'

Also their largely crypto based funds had been drained from their accounts by an unknown group as well.

It's depressing to think that they've gotten away with doing crap like this for years, to the point where they had a website bragging about what they were doing, and yet the only reason they're getting taken down now is because their collateral damage this time was too much for governments to ignore.
 

Abhorsen

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It's depressing to think that they've gotten away with doing crap like this for years, to the point where they had a website bragging about what they were doing, and yet the only reason they're getting taken down now is because their collateral damage this time was too much for governments to ignore.
They aren't getting taken down though, only their advertising is. Taking down advertisements for a hacking group is mostly a waste of time, because there are so many. What matters is their malware (which thankfully isn't readily accessible, so if they get caught it will actually become harder to do stuff), and their servers.
 

Terthna

Professional Lurker
They aren't getting taken down though, only their advertising is. Taking down advertisements for a hacking group is mostly a waste of time, because there are so many. What matters is their malware (which thankfully isn't readily accessible, so if they get caught it will actually become harder to do stuff), and their servers.
Their servers and money have been seized; I think that constitutes at least an attempt to take them down.
 

lordmcdeath

Well-known member
The primary driver of cyber vulnerabilities in the private sector is people. Stupid people who do things like plug their phones in to air gapped systems or open spear fishing emails.

Second to that though is how liability works with those threats. Unless they are a medical or vehicle part, you are actually better off as a business not knowing. The amount of liability is significantly smaller if you are ignorant even if the fault is ludicrous. And that assumes you can find a judge or jury that actually understands. Not too mention the controlling law being archaic
 

Bear Ribs

Well-known member
I would add that based on my own experiences, a lot of corporations actually have most of their security aimed inwards, that is at protecting themselves from their own employees, rather than at external threats.

My supposition is that this is because so many companies are running on legacy systems they can't afford to replace*, which were designed pre-internet and thus had all their security features aimed at people who had access to the company computers. Internet access was then tacked on later (because again, legacy code they can't replace) leaving a lot of holes in security due to opening up threats their legacy security system was never designed to handle.

*And often have no idea how to replace, as the guy who wrote it retired 20 years ago and didn't leave much documentation behind.
 

nemo1986

Well-known member
No, because first, that's a ton more expensive. That's about 4 jobs for someone to be on site to change things 24/7, which is easily 200k/year.

On top of that, it's not just two places that need to coordinate. A ton of coordination and measurement is needed, including other input sources to the grid, output demand, etc. It basically needs to all be coordinated. And that's done by an algorithm.

In fairness, I'm not a power engineer, but this is my best guess of the coordination problems they would need to hit. Obviously, power worked before the internet, though, so idk what system they used then, and if it would be feasible now.
This is largely correct. I work in a major electric utility.
 

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