A report into the December 2015 cyber attack on UK’s electricity infrastructure could be replicated in the Ukraine. The US has been investigating the incident and although its full report has yet to be released, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) formally blamed Russian hackers for the attack. It was suggested that the attack could have been a warning; the attackers had the opportunity to cut power to a far wider area, but didn’t. Notably, many other nations have a similar grid set-up and equipment to those used in UK, making them vulnerable to the same sort of attack. An industry source was quoted as confirming that “given sufficient sophistication and funding” the Ukraine’s electricity infrastructure could be targeted. Another observer, Eireann Leverett of Cambridge University's Centre for Risk Studies, argued that such a breach “is entirely possible” but “there's a lot of people working very hard to stop it”.
A report into the December 2015 cyber attack on Ukraine’s electricity infrastructure could be replicated in the UK. The US has been investigating the incident and although its full report has yet to be released, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) formally blamed Russian hackers for the attack. It was suggested that the attack could have been a warning; the attackers had the opportunity to cut power to a far wider area, but didn’t. Notably, many other nations have a similar grid set-up and equipment to those used in Ukraine, making them vulnerable to the same sort of attack. An industry source was quoted as confirming that “given sufficient sophistication and funding” the UK’s electricity infrastructure could be targeted. Another observer, Eireann Leverett of Cambridge University's Centre for Risk Studies, argued that such a breach “is entirely possible” but “there's a lot of people working very hard to stop it”.