Iranian Hackers targeting US oil, gas, and electric companies

For all the noise that the Syrian Electronic Army and China’s PLA Unit 61398 have been making recently, the US is facing a much deadlier threat to its cyber interests right now. State-sponsored hackers from Iran have reportedly ramped up their cyber-espionage campaign against the US in recent weeks, infiltrating a number of the country’s industrial control systems.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Iranian hackers have been able to gain access to the servers of several energy companies in the US. The government has refused to identify exactly how many, or which companies were involved, but its believed that they include oil, gas and electricity firms. Experts warn that the hackers could have easily manipulated oil and gas pipelines, potentially causing catastrophic damage to energy infrastructure and the environment had they chosen to do so. While it’s not clear to what extent the hackers infiltrated the company’s systems before being noticed, one official told the paper that they got “far enough to worry people”.

For the moment at least, we can breathe easy. Security experts believe that the Iranians are merely attempting to learn how the control systems work. Nevertheless, the fact they’re doing so can be considered a very ominous sign, as this kind of reconnaissance would be the first step in any co-ordinated attempt to disrupt or destroy critical infrastructure.
It might be early days yet, but US defence officials are said to be far more concerned with Iran’s activities than they are with China’s state-sponsored espionage.

“This is representative of stepped up cyber activity by the Iranian regime. The more they do this, the more our concerns grow,” said one anonymous official to the WSJ. “What they have done so far has certainly been noticed, and they should be cautious.”