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Off-Topic Discussion => General Discussion => Topic started by: WMCoolmon on January 19, 2008, 03:28:03 am

Title: Someone else needs to watch Battlestar Galactica
Post by: WMCoolmon on January 19, 2008, 03:28:03 am
At least, once they can get their power grid and other utilities back online. (http://www.informationweek.com/news/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=205901631)

They even have a fancy acronym for it, too: "SACDA (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SCADA)".
Title: Re: Someone else needs to watch Battlestar Galactica
Post by: Rictor on January 19, 2008, 08:58:35 pm
I dunno, "cyber-attacks" sounds awfully sensationalized. I think the threat of 1337 haXXors is vastly exagerated in the minds of ordinary folks. The article says these people may have had inside knowledge, in which case it would be rather easy to disable utilities.

The most serious case of "cyber terrorism" that I can recall to date was when a bunch of Russian hackers defaced websites owned by the Estonian government. IIRC, the damage was almost purely psychological.
Title: Re: Someone else needs to watch Battlestar Galactica
Post by: IceFire on January 19, 2008, 10:04:35 pm
...or the Transformers movie.

But honestly...when did this happen.  Next question...was this done by remote link from these services to the Internet at large or was this truly an inside job and someone had to gain some sort of physical access to a local network to start the attack.  If the utilities primary systems are somehow linked out the greater Internet that is the stupidest idea I can think of in terms of placing such a powerful thing in such a vulnerable position.
Title: Re: Someone else needs to watch Battlestar Galactica
Post by: Ashrak on January 20, 2008, 03:01:28 am
I dunno, "cyber-attacks" sounds awfully sensationalized. I think the threat of 1337 haXXors is vastly exagerated in the minds of ordinary folks. The article says these people may have had inside knowledge, in which case it would be rather easy to disable utilities.

The most serious case of "cyber terrorism" that I can recall to date was when a bunch of Russian hackers defaced websites owned by the Estonian government. IIRC, the damage was almost purely psychological.

it was purely logical, they used really odd weapons though, what it did was shut down network interfaces, without actually shutting em down, so no packet traffic was moving, but nothing was actually wrong either in the eyes of the nics
Title: Re: Someone else needs to watch Battlestar Galactica
Post by: Flipside on January 20, 2008, 03:09:24 am
Sorry, but it just sounds like beating on the 'fear' drum to me. They give no details other than 'it did happen, honest!'. Seems like it's just more attempts to angle at more control over the Internets.