Southcenter gathering designed to explore links, find weaknesses

SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER
By PAUL SHUKOVSKY
September 13, 2004

Imaginary cyberterrorists last week were engaged in a vicious attack on the Pacific Northwest.

The scenario was played out in a tabletop exercise at a Southcenter hotel meeting room by dozens of government and business leaders from around the region.

Experts in security and critical infrastructure gathered to uncover vulnerabilities to a cyberterror attack that could cause basic services, such as electricity, water and banking to crash.

Cybertechnology is simultaneously "one of our nation's greatest strengths and one of our nation's greatest vulnerabilities," said Maj. Gen. Timothy Lowenberg, adjutant general of the state National Guard, in opening remarks to experts on critical infrastructure.

The problem is that while computer technology increases efficiency and productivity across the spectrum of human endeavors, it also provides an access point for cyberterrorists to disrupt telecommunications, utilities and other major systems in profound ways.

For example, dams, electric distribution grids, municipal water supplies and gas pipelines -- to name a few -- are all remotely controlled by computerized systems that relay orders to open and close distant switches and valves. A cyberterrorist able to hack into such a system could cause chaos by opening a dam spillway or shutting down a high-voltage power line.

Last week's exercise was designed to explore the interdependencies among these various sectors. When there's a power failure, banking and finance stops.

When a municipal water distribution system goes down, it has huge ramifications for hospitals and public health.

Acknowledgment of those interdependencies and the vulnerabilities they create brought to the table more than 100 experts from Seattle, King County, several states, including Washington, the Department of Homeland Security, the Navy, Army and Marine Corps, Microsoft, Boeing, the FBI, numerous U.S. and Canadian utilities, the Bonneville Power Administration and the Los Alamos, Sandia and Argonne national laboratories.

[ Read more ]