https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/cy...?ocid=msedgntp
Cyberattack Forces a Shutdown of a Top U.S. Pipeline
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One of the nation’s largest pipelines, which carries refined gasoline and jet fuel from Texas up the East Coast to New York, was forced to shut down after being hit by ransomware in a demonstration of the vulnerability of energy infrastructure to cyberattacks.
a group of people riding on the back of a truck: A Colonial Pipeline facility in Pelham, Ala. The company said it learned on Friday that it “was the victim of a cybersecurity attack.”© Jay Reeves/Associated Press A Colonial Pipeline facility in Pelham, Ala. The company said it learned on Friday that it “was the victim of a cybersecurity attack.”
The operator of the system, Colonial Pipeline, said in a statement late Friday that it had shut down its 5,500 miles of pipeline, which it says carries 45 percent of the East Coast’s fuel supplies, in an effort to contain the breach on its computer networks. Earlier Friday, there were disruptions along the pipeline, but it was not immediately clear whether that was a direct result of the attack, or the company’s moves to proactively halt it.
Colonial Pipeline indicated Saturday afternoon that its systems were hit by ransomware, in which hackers hold a victim’s data hostage until it pays a ransom, but it did not say when normal operations would resume. Still, the shutdown of such a vital pipeline, one that has been serving the East Coast since the early 1960s, highlights the vulnerability of aging infrastructure that has been connected, directly or indirectly, to the internet.
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