Digital Utility Group
The mission of this group is to bring together utility professionals in the power industry who are in the thick of the digital utility transformation.
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Do the Chinese “own” our electric grids and other infrastructures?
The national focus on cyber security has been on data breach including ransomware which is what precipitated the August 25, 2021, White House Cyber security meeting. For IT networks, the focus on data breach is sufficient. However, the real concern for critical infrastructures is not data breach but equipment damage that can cause very extended outages and potentially kill people. Chinese-made grid equipment is widely used in the US electric grid. Backdoors have been found in some of the Chinese-made equipment bypassing all cyber security protections. Securing the electric grid will require a combination of many different approaches including making the economics of buying Chinese-made products less affordable, eliminating use of known Chinese-front companies providing grid equipment and services, addressing networking and engineering issues, changing the scope of the NERC CIPS to focus on the reliability and cyber security of the grid not just routable networks, monitoring the process sensors off-line and in real time, and having engineering participation.
Do the Chinese “own” our electric grids and other infrastructures?
This blog could have been written by the famous threat analyst Pogo Possum who said: “we have met the enemy and they is us”. Presidential Executive Order (EO) 13920 was meant to prevent the use of Chinese-made products in critical bulk electric grid applications. The EO was also meant to address hardware supply chain issues as the Chinese had installed hardware backdoors that bypassed all cyber security protections. However, neither is happening. As a result, China is in a position to “own” our electric grids and other critical infrastructures at times of their choosing.
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