Ontario-based Hydro One Limited, an electricity transmission, and Distribution Company is said to have become the latest victim of Cyber Attack. But the good news is that no data has been compromised in this attack yet.
Canada Law Enforcement Forces in association with Hydro One authorities have investigated and concluded that this could have evolved into a major cyber threat if officials from the firm weren’t alerted at the right time.
Rick Haier, the CSO of Hydro One, said that hackers did target one of the firm’s server IP addresses in November 2016. But he also added that the IP address in question is not an active IP address at the power station and isn’t connected to the computer network of the power station. So, there is no reason to believe that the power station’s valuable data has been compromised.
In general, if hackers target individual pieces of software in a network, we cannot assume that they have targeted at an entity or its owners. It might have just happened in a possible random attack taken up by Zombies or Bots.
Hackers are usually on a hunt for weak spots in the security of anything connected to the web and in this trend they usually target IP addresses, servers, computers, CCTV cameras and all Wi-Fi enabled devices like Smart Phones.
They then send malicious software like Ransomware, which allows them to take over a database and use it for nefarious activities.
As per our sources, the IP address in question was set up in the 1990s by a defunct company called Ontario Hydro. When the said company was divided into two smaller companies, the IP Address was passed on to Hydro One.
Usually, all such unmonitored or decommissioned IP addresses act as a sink hole to the entire organizations. Hackers, some of them who are state-sponsored, can use these web addresses to gain an entry into the network.
For this reason, on December 29th, 2016, FBI and US department of Homeland Security issued a report outlining the tools and methods exercised by Russian Intelligence and Civilian hackers. Because such loopholes can cause a serious damage to the reputation of an organization usually making it irrepressible forever.
