Fear The Power-Grid Hack. Also Fear How Little The U.S. Knows About It

"LAS VEGAS -- The robust and agressive takedown of part of Ukraine’s power grid by hackers served as a wakeup call for cyber experts and exposed just how much America does not know about foreign operatives’ ability to strike critical U.S. infrastructure.

Electrical grids are on the minds of those gathered at Black Hat, the world’s biggest hacker convention that entered its final day Thursday. The confab draws 16,000 hackers and information technology experts from around the globe.

Worries about infrastructure have grown since presumed Russian government-linked hackers last December shut down power to a section of the Ukrainian capital of Kiev, marking the second straight year they’ve blacked out part of the country as part of Russia’s drive to bring Ukraine back under its geopolitical wing.

Hackers routinely come to the Black Hat convention to demonstrate how to break into electronic systems embedded in medical devices, ATMs, cars, routers and mobile phones. This year, at the 20th annual gathering, one security researcher walked attendees through a hack of a wind farm."

Tim Johnson reports for McClatchy Washington Bureau July 27, 2017.