Hackers Manipulated Water Supply at Unnamed Water District – ‘Kemuri’.
The unnamed water district, referred to as Kemuri, had asked Verizon Security Solutions to conduct a proactive assessment as part of its efforts to keep systems and networks healthy. Experts soon discovered clear signs of malicious activity. They immediately noticed that the organization had a poor security architecture, with Internet-facing systems plagued by high-risk vulnerabilities. Hackers took advantage of outdated systems and poor cyber hygiene and were able to cross breach, jumping from the IT side to the OT side, to access 2.5 million financial records and to manipulate the area’s water supply.
The 'Kemuri' Water Company was able to remediate the changes made to the water supply, and the customer impact was minimal. But the insecurity of the plant’s networks could have led to far more serious consequences, including risk to human safety.