Posted on 10/19/2013 5:44:07 AM PDT by markomalley
Over the past few months, the discoveries of two engineers have led to a steady trickle of alarms from the Department of Homeland Security concerning a threat to the nation’s power grid. Yet hardly anyone has noticed.
The advisories concern vulnerabilities in the communication protocol used by power and water utilities to remotely monitor control stations around the country. Using those vulnerabilities, an attacker at a single, unmanned power substation could inflict a widespread power outage.
Still, the two engineers who discovered the vulnerability say little is being done.
Adam Crain and Chris Sistrunk do not specialize in security. The engineers say they hardly qualify as security researchers. But seven months ago, Mr. Crain wrote software to look for defects in an open-source software program. The program targeted a very specific communications protocol called DNP3, which is predominantly used by electric and water companies, and plays a crucial role in so-called S.C.A.D.A. (supervisory control and data acquisition) systems. Utility companies use S.C.A.D.A. systems to monitor far-flung power stations from a control center, in part because it allows them to remotely diagnose problems rather than wait for a technician to physically drive out to a station and fix it.
(Excerpt) Read more at bits.blogs.nytimes.com ...
The Ethernet interfaces on most SCADA controllers are shipped with default admin passwords in place.
Early 90s. At EPRI, we were running security workshops back then. You would have been amazed at the number of unprotected modems that allowed you access to SCADA systems (in the era of “war dialing”). The most rudimentary steps to protect systems were not taken and it was extremely hard to get the industry concerned and to act.
“shower, shave, cook and poop”...only if the sewage plant receiving your waste is working. You may have to figure out how to dispose of your waste water and sewage on your property if you are connected to a city sewer.
Nothing will be done to harden the grid. At some point it will be taken down. Count on it. Be thinking about an alternative power source for your own place.
“But consider a 500 gallon propane tank vs. 50 gallon diesel barrel.”
If you can obtain a 500 gallon propane tank you can get more than1 55 gallon barrel. Not a fair question. I can find diesel. Propane not so much.
Propane is where natural gas pipelines are not.
Number 1 diesel is about 136,000 Btu per gallon and Number 2 heating fuel is about 140,000 Btu per gallon.
You can take the math from there. You all might want to bookmark this Comparative Fuel Values for future use.
Propane is essentially universally available in the States. See your Yellow Pages.
pipe it to the lib down the street :-)
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