It has been reported by the Record that hackers have launched five cyberattacks against Britain’s drinking water suppliers since the beginning of last year, according to reports filed with the drinking water watchdog and partially disclosed to Recorded Future News under freedom of information laws. Here, CEO of Closed Door Security William Wright, responds.

“This is an interesting piece of research from the Record and it could be said the UK’s water supply has suffered five very close calls over the last two years.

Fortunately, these incidents haven’t had an impact on UK drinking water, but what if they had? Even just a small chemical alteration could prove catastrophic for the country.

While most details around the incidents will never be revealed, it would be interesting to understand who the perpetrators were as this would provide more information around their motives.

Did the attackers want money from a ransom demand, or were the attacks actually intended to cause harm and destruction to the UK?

Other critical industries must use these incidents as a catalyst to prioritise their cyber and OT defences. The adoption of the NCSC’s Cyber Assessment Framework is key to building out resilience.

Furthermore, OT and IT must be segregated because attacks that pivot from IT to OT can have life threatening consequences.

All assets must be inventoried, up to date, seen and secured, while legacy equipment must be layered with additional solutions to ensure attackers can’t access it through weak controls.

This also must also be thoroughly tested, while staff should be trained and organisations should conduct regular cyber incident response planning.”

Read the Record article, here

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