India’s Northern power grid crashed on Monday morning wreaking havoc at airports, railway and metro stations, hospitals and across traffic congested roads, its worst power outage in a decade.
Indian power infrastructure under attack: India losing out millions in just hours same snag developed within just 24 hours of recovery reports say the system is infected by sophisticated malware.
Malware is spreading; today more than 67 crore people are without power. Cyber analysts suspect "PAK"- CHINA nexus behind this attack.
Hundreds of millions of people have been left without electricity in northern and eastern India after a massive power breakdown.
There are some analyst saying that it is cyber Attack by a Malware but no Indian Authorities confirmed it yet. Authorities are restoring the service suggest the whole thing is out of their skills, meanwhile mainstream media has been barred from reporting as this could bring disgrace to security services of India.
Since the first power trip up on Monday, there have been discussions within the security establishment about the possibility of entities trying to carry out a sophisticated cyber-attack to cripple the grids.
Officials who carried out an audit of critical information infrastructure admit it is "theoretically possible" to cripple India's power grids through a cyber-attack.
Despite such a possibility, the shutdown did not seem to have led to a crisis management procedure that aimed at ruling out or confirming a cyber-attack.
"Given the fact that our grids are vulnerable to a cyber-attack, those responsible for managing grids should have a proactive policy to rule out cyber-attack as part of their crisis management procedures," a senior official said. "But none of it was visible," he added.
Sources aware of contacts among power ministry, power grid authorities and those in both CERT-IN ( Computer Emergency Response Team-India) and NTRO (National Technical Research Organisation) say there was no proactive effort by those responsible for power grids.
However, both CERT-IN and NTRO are believed to have established their own procedures to ensure the shutdowns were not a cyber-attack, having been brought on by massive over-the-limit withdrawals by states to supply electricity for pumps tapping groundwater in the absence of rainfall during this monsoon.
Officials said the government is now discussing possible ways to speed up the setting up of National Critical Information Infrastructure Protection Centre (NCIPC), which would act as the command and control centre for monitoring the critical information infrastructure of the country. NCIPC was recently approved by the National Security Council headed by the Prime Minster.
Sources said the government is also planning to hold a national consultation of all stakeholders involved in critical information infrastructure.
The government is already setting up dedicated CERT-INs for various critical sectors such as power and civil aviation.
Officials point out to breaches reported from power grids in the US, cyber intrusion into the Iranian nuclear network and other such incidents around the world to warn that India needs to have a more robust crisis management procedure that includes proactive ruling out of cyber-attacks.
Follow @thehackersmediaIndian power infrastructure under attack: India losing out millions in just hours same snag developed within just 24 hours of recovery reports say the system is infected by sophisticated malware.
Malware is spreading; today more than 67 crore people are without power. Cyber analysts suspect "PAK"- CHINA nexus behind this attack.
Hundreds of millions of people have been left without electricity in northern and eastern India after a massive power breakdown.
There are some analyst saying that it is cyber Attack by a Malware but no Indian Authorities confirmed it yet. Authorities are restoring the service suggest the whole thing is out of their skills, meanwhile mainstream media has been barred from reporting as this could bring disgrace to security services of India.
Since the first power trip up on Monday, there have been discussions within the security establishment about the possibility of entities trying to carry out a sophisticated cyber-attack to cripple the grids.
Officials who carried out an audit of critical information infrastructure admit it is "theoretically possible" to cripple India's power grids through a cyber-attack.
Despite such a possibility, the shutdown did not seem to have led to a crisis management procedure that aimed at ruling out or confirming a cyber-attack.
"Given the fact that our grids are vulnerable to a cyber-attack, those responsible for managing grids should have a proactive policy to rule out cyber-attack as part of their crisis management procedures," a senior official said. "But none of it was visible," he added.
Sources aware of contacts among power ministry, power grid authorities and those in both CERT-IN ( Computer Emergency Response Team-India) and NTRO (National Technical Research Organisation) say there was no proactive effort by those responsible for power grids.
However, both CERT-IN and NTRO are believed to have established their own procedures to ensure the shutdowns were not a cyber-attack, having been brought on by massive over-the-limit withdrawals by states to supply electricity for pumps tapping groundwater in the absence of rainfall during this monsoon.
Officials said the government is now discussing possible ways to speed up the setting up of National Critical Information Infrastructure Protection Centre (NCIPC), which would act as the command and control centre for monitoring the critical information infrastructure of the country. NCIPC was recently approved by the National Security Council headed by the Prime Minster.
Sources said the government is also planning to hold a national consultation of all stakeholders involved in critical information infrastructure.
The government is already setting up dedicated CERT-INs for various critical sectors such as power and civil aviation.
Officials point out to breaches reported from power grids in the US, cyber intrusion into the Iranian nuclear network and other such incidents around the world to warn that India needs to have a more robust crisis management procedure that includes proactive ruling out of cyber-attacks.
