America on Emergency Alert: Covert Attacks from Within Revealed

The United States government has warned of cyberattack threats against devices used to operate and monitor water facilities and other critical infrastructure. Unidentified hackers are reportedly attempting to breach devices manufactured by Siemens.

The warning was issued in a cybersecurity advisory published on Wednesday (19/8). The US National Security Agency (NSA), FBI, Department of Energy, Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) issued the joint warning.

In the advisory, the US government cited an active threat against all Siemens S7 series programmable logic controllers (PLCs) used across various critical infrastructure sectors. These devices control and monitor industrial processes, with applications spanning manufacturing, energy, water and wastewater treatment, chemicals, food, and agriculture.

The US government warned that if hackers successfully take over these devices, the impact could be severe. Attacks could disrupt critical processes, trigger safety incidents, cause operational shutdowns, and damage equipment. Hackers could also steal sensitive data and trigger compliance violations. Disruptions could spread to interconnected systems, creating a cascading effect on critical infrastructure.

Making the threat more serious, hackers are reportedly beginning to use artificial intelligence (AI) to accelerate attack processes, according to Reuters. According to US government agencies, AI allows attackers to drastically reduce the technical expertise and time previously required to develop exploits capable of breaching systems.

CISA had previously warned on 30 July of a significant increase in attacks against PLCs. That warning followed a 22 July advisory revealing that hackers affiliated with Iran were exploiting PLC devices made by Siemens, Rockwell Automation, and Schneider Electric.

The threat emerged as several local water systems in multiple US states were targeted by cyberattacks in recent weeks. Cybersecurity experts suspect the series of attacks is linked to Iran. However, US federal officials have not officially connected the attacks on local water systems to Iran.

President Donald Trump said on 31 July that he did not believe Iran was behind the attacks. Trump instead blamed Minnesota, the first state to report a wave of at least 30 cyber incidents related to water facilities on 26 and 27 July.