Hackers at the Controls

An FBI report seen here details what could be seen as the hacking elite sect of Anonymous, Antisec, using a backdoor to compromise an air-conditioning control system in New Jersey.

This leaves me to the question of how vulnerable the government and private sectors are for these types of compromise of SCADA and building control systems.

Most hack jobs are attempts at ‘low hanging fruit’ or extraction of data. If the players are looking to ‘step it up’, then the heart of the data centers must be considered.

They are all, large and small, requiring the same components:

- Power

- HVAC (heat exchange)

- Flame Retardant Systems

- Secondary Power (UPS and generators)

- Physical Controls

- Space and Equipment

This may fall under facilities or IT, or a mixture of both, but a lot is vendor supported so that means controls go out the window.

Default or low strength passwords may be common!

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