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U.S.'s Biggest Gasoline Pipeline Halted After Cyberattack

washingtonpost.com

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Re: U.S.'s Biggest Gasoline Pipeline Halted After Cyberattack

#81

Post by 8note »

exikyut wrote: post #64
tw04 wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why wouldn't you use a unidirectional connection for time series and event data? I understand why you might want to send things out to the rest of the world, I can't fathom why you wouldn't require physical access to have write access.

Genuine question (that I've been seriously wondering about for a long time): how do you implement validated attestation that a piece of log data has reached nonvolatile storage, triggered appropriate alarms, and that those alarm events have been acknowledged, while using a data diode type setup?

What do you do when this attestation fails? Eg. A fox chewed through the cable and the ack can't be received.

Re: U.S.'s Biggest Gasoline Pipeline Halted After Cyberattack

#82

Post by joejerryronnie »

BoorishBears wrote: post #43
joejerryronnie wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’d prefer a new Cybersecurity branch of the military with full funding and resources rather than Space Force.

I've always secretly hoped warfare would move to the digital realm soley. We have some shades of that happening already, but I imagine a future where instead of sending young people to die,warring nations wreck each others economies remotely... which again isn't too far from current day. While there'd still be casualties it wouldn't be nearly as barbaric as current wars, more developed nations would finally have as m…

I think you’re going to see this more and more (at least with wealthy nations). And I think the motivation for war has always been primarily about profit.

Re: U.S.'s Biggest Gasoline Pipeline Halted After Cyberattack

#83

Post by [deleted] »

dehrmann wrote: post #74
jtchang wrote: post #51

In a twisted sort of way I am happy to see these types of ransomware attacks making headlines. Before it was much harder to quantify how much a breach might cost but with ransomeware you get a fuzzy lower bound. Also the prevalence of these attacks might actually make us all safer in the long run.

This one in particular is good because, it's public, it's not that scary, but it's easy to make the jump to scary attacks.

[deleted]

Re: U.S.'s Biggest Gasoline Pipeline Halted After Cyberattack

#84

Post by pm90 »

adrianmonk wrote: post #78
aardvarkr wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That would be domestic terrorism and is an easy way to turn the entire population against the cause

It could do more harm than good, but it remains possible that someone will do it anyway. It's a legitimate scenario for these types of companies to consider in their cyber-security planning and preparation (assuming they have any).

Domestic attacks would be somewhat more difficult to carry out without being detected. It’s much easier for the Government to track domestic actors since there’s so much data collected on them both Nationally and by local law enforcement.

That’s why international attacks are more prevalent and bold: they’re not as easily traceable. However, that also comes with its downsides: if the USG wants, it might just use lethal force against you.

So ultimately the people who tend to do this repeatedly end up being state owned or state protected actors, who are likely offered some sort of protection by their State from retribution by the USG.

Re: U.S.'s Biggest Gasoline Pipeline Halted After Cyberattack

#85

Post by throwawayboise »

nabilhat wrote: post #70
koheripbal wrote: post #41

Washington Post reported it was a ransomware attack. It may not have been a targeted attack.

The WaPo article itself is much more detailed. The bits about the age and fragility of Colonial's pipelines are far more significant than ransomware. Colonial's continued neglect is more disruptive than any single attack on the pipeline. The persistence of unreliable infrastructure is a more valuable disruptive asset to an organized opponent than a single targeted attack. Tangent - Also interesting, the WaPo article…

Relates to the Kent Beck "Latency vs Througput" post[1] on here right now... do you post the story immediately, and start getting feedback, or do you wait and do research and get it (more) right before posting it?

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27088272

Re: U.S.'s Biggest Gasoline Pipeline Halted After Cyberattack

#86

Post by DangitBobby »

adventured wrote: post #80
DangitBobby wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do cryptocurrencies save you from a debt based economy or inflation? Don't you still need to pay for goods and services in the same debt-based economy? How does the flavor of money change whether someone needs to go into debt? What would prevent cryptocurrency values from inflating or deflating?

A large cryptocurrency like Bitcoin is entirely capable of functioning like gold as a hedge against fiat inflation. I'm not much of a crypto cultist (which is the latest trend here on HN, to tag anybody that defends crypto with that to shut down conversation), however it's extraordinarily obvious at this point how cryptocurrencies can help you evade inflation in eg USD or evade the debt damage to the US economy. Bitc…

You've used the word obvious several times, but strong political opinions and conjecture underlies every aspect of this response. Debt-based economy does not obviously refer to the fact that the dollar is printed by the fed. Your response also doesn't really address how it saves us from the debt based economy that we all have no choice but to participate in. There is no debate about whether sovereign currencies will continue to be maintained by governments. They will, and they will use their military might to protect the sovereignty. Your position here is akin to saying that if I park all my money in gold, I am no longer a victim of the debt based economy.

I don't know if the gradual, typically controlled and predictable inflation of fiat currencies is worse than constant value fluctuations due to speculators in cryptocurrencies, but that's obviously for each individual to determine for themselves.

I am also curious, is it impossible for new BTC (for example) to be minted? Is it possible to change that? My understanding is yes. If so, it sounds like someone could play the same role as the fed there if they really wanted to.

And what happens to the value in the event of a fork of BTC that attempts to make BTC actually useful as a currency instead of just as a commodity? Is this an additional vector of instability in the value of the "currency"?

Re: U.S.'s Biggest Gasoline Pipeline Halted After Cyberattack

#87

Post by euroderf »

protomyth wrote: post #42

Perhaps we should pass a law that no utilities / infrastructure should be attached to the internet. Private networks are fine for this purpose.

In 1983 the US military hived off MILNET, their portion of teh interwebz. Perhaps it's time for infra to do likewise. Too simple?

Re: U.S.'s Biggest Gasoline Pipeline Halted After Cyberattack

#88

Post by bourgwaletariat »

I wonder if this has anything to do with the Colonial gas pipeline leak? It's been a problem for over 8 months now. Was in the news recently again. Over a million gallons spilled, but they don't really know how much.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/eight-months-later-colonia...

Re: U.S.'s Biggest Gasoline Pipeline Halted After Cyberattack

#89

Post by ArkanExplorer »

aardvarkr wrote: post #18
ArkanExplorer wrote: post #9

Given Government inaction on climate change, could we begin to see motivated individuals or groups taking matters into their own hands and targeting fossil fuel infrastructure in this manner?

That would be domestic terrorism and is an easy way to turn the entire population against the cause

With a bus load of activists you could probably shut down a coal mine or coal power plant. Just repeat the interruptions until the location is closed.

Environmentalists used to chain themselves to trees. Would the same physical actions work for climate change?

Its difficult to see the public being opposed to this when coal infrastructure is on the edge of irrelevancy anyway and easily replaced.

Re: U.S.'s Biggest Gasoline Pipeline Halted After Cyberattack

#90

Post by jeffbee »

mikewarot wrote: post #60

Connecting infrastructure to the internet is something that is done for many reasons. It would be a vast improvement of security if most of those connections went through a data diode[1] and only allowed monitoring. Knowing what is happening now with critical infrastructure, through the internet, can be done in a completely safe manner. It is a solved problem. [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unidirectional_networ…

What would be the difference between having a data diode between your control and monitoring network and external monitoring systems, versus just splitting the monitoring part off into a completely separate network with ordinary two-way traffic?
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