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United States electrical grid growing more vulnerable to cyberattacks, regulator says

U.S. power grids are increasingly susceptible to cyberattacks, with the number of susceptible points in electrical networks increasing by about 60 per day, the North American Electric Dependability Corporation ( NERC) stated in a webcast on Thursday.

The grids' virtual and physical weak spots, or points in software application or hardware that are vulnerable to cyber crooks, grew to a range of 23,000 to 24,000 in 2015 from 21,000 to 22,000 by the end of 2022, executives with the energy regulator stated.

It's very hard to keep pace with addressing all those vulnerabilities, said Manny Cancel, senior vice president of NERC.

Geopolitical dispute, including Russia's intrusion of Ukraine and the war in Gaza, have dramatically increased the number of cyber risks to North American power grids, NERC stated. Dangers also commonly originated from China, and the regulators said they anticipate the approaching U.S. presidential election to increase the probability of attacks on the grid.

We're going to be very alert throughout this present election cycle, Cancel said.

Physical attacks on the grid have remained high since increasing in 2022, with about 2,800 reports of shooting, vandalism and other strikes on electrical networks in 2015, NERC stated. Some 3% of those attacks resulted in interruptions or other functional problems.

(source: Reuters)