Canada Says Hackers Tampered With ICS at Water Facility, Oil and Gas Firm

The Canadian Centre for Cyber Security has warned CISOs and other decision-makers that hacktivists are increasingly targeting internet-exposed industrial control systems (ICS).

The government cybersecurity agency has provided several examples of recent attacks reported to authorities. In one incident, hackers targeted a water facility and tampered with water pressure valves, which resulted in degraded service for the community served by the compromised facility.

In another incident, hackers triggered false alarms at a Canadian oil and gas company by tampering with an automated tank gauge (ATG). ATGs are often plagued by severe vulnerabilities and they have been targeted by hackers for at least a decade.

The third example shared by the Canadian Centre for Cyber Security describes an attack on a farm, with attackers manipulating temperature and humidity parameters in a grain-drying silo. The agency noted that the hackers’ actions could have resulted in unsafe conditions had they not been caught ...