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A failed attempt in December to take down parts of Poland’s power grid was the work of Russian government hackers known for causing power outages in the past, according to a security research firm that investigated the incident.
Last week, Polish Energy Minister Milos Motycka He told reporters The attempted cyberattack on December 29 and 30 saw hackers target two heat and power plants, in addition to attempting to disrupt communication links between renewable energy facilities, such as wind turbines, and power distribution operators.
Motycka described the incident as the “strongest attack” on Poland’s energy infrastructure in years, along with the Polish government Blame Moscow to try. Local media I mentioned The attacks could have cut off heat and electricity in at least half a million homes across the country.
On Friday, cybersecurity company ESET He said it happened A version of the destructive malware, which it calls DynoWiper. This type of malware, known as “wiper” malware, is designed to irreversibly destroy data on computers to prevent them from functioning.
ESET attributed the malware with “moderate confidence” to the hacking group known as Sand worma unit within Russia’s military intelligence agency GRU, based on “strong overlap” with its prior research into prior Sandworm malware, including the group’s use of destructive malware to target Ukraine’s energy sector.
Freelance journalist Kim Zetter Reported for the first time News.
As Zetter noted, the cyberattacks targeting Poland come nearly a decade after Sandworm’s first known cyberattack on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure in 2015, which knocked out power to more than 230,000 homes around the country’s capital, Kiev. A similar cyber attack hit Ukraine’s power systems a year later.
Following the hacking attempt, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said the country’s cybersecurity defenses had succeeded, and “at no time was critical infrastructure threatened.”