Lawmakers see cyber threats to electrical grid

Tag : Electrical Suppliers

The U.S. and Canadian governments have given NERC authority toensure the reliability of the electric grid. Last October, a NERCofficial told Congress that utilities covering 75 percent of theU.S. power grid were taking actions to fix Aurora vulnerabilitiesfirst identified by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security in2006.
But the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) released a report on Wednesday identifying numerous cyber vulnerabilities at theTennessee Valley Authority (TVA), the nation's largest public powercompany. The GAO issued 92 recommendations to the TVA, whichsupplies power to 8.7 million U.S. residents in Tennessee and partsof six other states.
"The corporate network was interconnected with control systemsnetworks GAO reviewed, thereby increasing the risk that securityweaknesses on the corporate network could affect those controlsystems networks," the GAO report said.