Domestic Terrorists Could Use OSINT To Pinpoint US Substations For a Blackout (darkreading.com)

An anonymous reader writes: A project called 'Gridstrike' found that free and publicly available information can be used to determine the most critical electric substations in the US, which if attacked, could result in a nationwide blackout. Researchers from iSIGHT Partners used a combination of publicly available transmission substation information, maps, Google Earth, and grid congestion documentation, and drew correlations among the substations that serve the top ten cities in the US. They ID'ed 15 substations that if attacked and knocked offline would result in a nationwide blackout, they say. Their research took the spin of whether a homegrown terror group with little funding could get this crucial information. The study was inspired by the 2013 Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) study in 2013 that found that attacks on just nine electric substations in the U.S. could cause a blackout across the entire grid.

Comments

there is a solution

[Gravis Zero]

the solution to this is to completely decentralize our power, virtually destroying "the grid" by putting solar+battery at every home. it wont work for absolutely everyone but it will work for the vast majority of people. it comes with nice side effects too: it will cause people to buy more efficient electronics, lower the price of solar panels, devastate the coal/gas industry which in turn will cause a massive reduction in CO2 emissions and result in fewer mountain tops being blown up.

so you get security, energy independence, massive pollution reduction and preserving the environment. what's not to like? oh yeah, it doesn't pay congress critters to stay in office, so it wont happen. #BanCongress ;-P