Aditya K Sood, a cybersecurity expert, demonstrated how easily he accessed a solar power plant's remote dashboard in India, highlighting common weaknesses such as default and weak passwords. He warned that hackers could exploit these vulnerabilities, potentially disrupting energy supply to major grids. Experts from Germany's RWTH university confirmed that many systems are susceptible to such attacks, which could be exploited during geopolitical tensions, threatening energy security and stability, especially amid hybrid warfare challenges.
"You know, people deploy their devices and forget to actually change [default] passwords. Or they have configured very weak passwords," Sood says as he's pointing to the system open in front of him on the screen.
"While it is technically possible for a customer to assign a weak password and provide open access to their network on the Internet, we do not recommend this," Solar-Log added.
Experts claim that had they manipulated the power those plants feed into the European power grid, they could have caused blackouts, a real threat amid the hybrid warfare against the West.
At the RWTH technical university in Aachen, Germany, Andreas Ulbig and his team have been studying threats to interconnected energy systems for years.
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