Cybersecurity Official: Many Water Facilities Still Unaware of Threat

SUBSCRIBER+ EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW — Last week The Cipher Brief published a look at the threat to the nation’s water supply posed by cyberattacks – an issue brought to the fore by a series of recent hacks against local water facilities in different parts of the U.S. While the attacks have caused limited damage, Cipher Brief experts warned that some of the perpetrators – particularly those tied to nation states including Russia, China and Iran – are probing local water systems for weakness, with the likely aim of gaining a cyber-foothold should they wish to carry out more damaging attacks in the future. 

Warnings about the issue have come from FBI Director Christopher Wray, the Environmental Protection Agency, and from the White House, which has asked the nation’s governors to draw up plans by June 28 to deal with cybersecurity risks in their states’ water systems.