Cyberterrorism and the Security of the National Drinking Water Infrastructure

Free Beer + Pizza as usual.

The national drinking water infrastructure is vitally important to protection of public health and safety and also supports business, industry, and the national economy. While steps have been taken since 9/11 to identify and mitigate vulnerabilities the drinking water infrastructure, serious vulnerabilities remain.

In this talk, John will discuss and review the challenges of physical and cyber security for the national public drinking water infrastructure and provide his observations, based on 13 years running a local water department and 5 years in IT, on the existing security gaps and what should be done about them.

Part of this talk will be based on a talk he gave at the American Water Works Association (AWWA) Water Security Congress in April, 2009 in Washington, DC about a strategic weakness of the national infrastructure. He will also review the state of cyber insecurity of the drinking water infrastructure, the threats currently known to their SCADA systems, and the potential threats and countermeasures that should be considered.

John is an IT Pro from Cohasset. He is currently researching the security of the national drinking water infrastructure. He was an elected Water Commissioner for 13 years. He has presented on this topic at Defcon 18 and Shmoocon 2011.