Cigar
01-17-2013, 08:10 AM
A US power plant was recently hit by a virus thanks to an infected USB stick, a report from the Department of Homeland Security has revealed.
The virus, a Trojan used for identity theft, was unwittingly introduced by a technician working for a third party contractor, and kept the power plant offline for three weeks.
"When the IT employee inserted the drive into a computer with up-to-date antivirus software, the antivirus software produced three positive hits," says the DHS's Computer Emergency Readiness Team (ICS-CERT) in a report.
USB sticks are a notoriously simple way for attackers to gain entry to industrial control systems. Both the Stuxnet worm and the Flame malware, reportedly developed by the US and Israel to attack systems in Iran, relied on USB drives to gain access.
http://www.tgdaily.com/security-brief/68813-usb-sticks-infect-two-power-plants-with-malware
The virus, a Trojan used for identity theft, was unwittingly introduced by a technician working for a third party contractor, and kept the power plant offline for three weeks.
"When the IT employee inserted the drive into a computer with up-to-date antivirus software, the antivirus software produced three positive hits," says the DHS's Computer Emergency Readiness Team (ICS-CERT) in a report.
USB sticks are a notoriously simple way for attackers to gain entry to industrial control systems. Both the Stuxnet worm and the Flame malware, reportedly developed by the US and Israel to attack systems in Iran, relied on USB drives to gain access.
http://www.tgdaily.com/security-brief/68813-usb-sticks-infect-two-power-plants-with-malware