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TECHNOLOGY Friday 11 august 2017
Take down: Hackers looking to shut down factories for pay

By EMERY P. DALESIO can,’” Miller said.
AP Business Writer One high-profile example
DURHAM, N.C. (AP) — The came in May and June,
malware entered the when auto manufactur-
North Carolina transmission ers including Renault shut
plant’s computer network down production after
via email last August, just they were swept up in the
as the criminals wanted, worldwide onslaught of the
spreading like a virus and WannaCry ransomware vi-
threatening to lock up the rus. But attackers also are
production line until the increasingly injecting ways
company paid a ransom. to remotely control the ro-
AW North Carolina stood bots and other automated
to lose $270,000 in revenue, systems that control pro-
plus wages for idled em- duction inside targeted
ployees, for every hour the factories. The threat of
factory wasn’t shipping its computer code tailored to
crucial auto parts to nine hit specific targets has been
Toyota car and truck plants around since researchers in
across North America, said 2010 discovered Stuxnet,
John Peterson, the plant’s malware apparently de-
information technology signed to sabotage Iran’s
manager. The company is nuclear program by caus-
just one of a growing num- This undated photo provided by AW North Carolina shows production operations inside the ing centrifuge machines to
ber being hit by cyber-crim- company’s Durham, N.C., factory. spin out of control. Stuxnet
inals looking for a payday. Associated Press is widely believed to be a
While online thieves have nals go away by paying turers, government and fi- industries often don’t report covert American and Israeli
long targeted banks for the sums demanded. “They nancial firms are now the attacks for fear of dimin- creation, but neither coun-
digital holdups, today’s may not know what that top targets globally for illicit ished public perception. try has officially acknowl-
just-in-time manufacturing number is, but they know intrusions by criminals, for- But attacks demanding edged a role in the attack.
sector is climbing toward it’s not zero. So what is that eign espionage agencies ransom against all U.S. insti- Malicious software that at-
the top of hackers’ hit lists. number? Where do you and others up to no good, tutions are spiraling higher. tacked Ukraine’s electric-
Production lines that inte- flinch?” Last August at the according to a report this The FBI’s Internet Crime ity grid last December was
grate computer-imaging, 2,200-worker Durham trans- spring by NTT Security. Complaint Center re- built to remotely sabotage
barcode scanners and mission factory, the com- A survey of nearly 3,000 ceived 2,673 ransomware circuit breakers, switches
measuring tolerances to puter virus coursed through corporate cybersecurity reports in the year ending and protection relays, re-
a hair’s width at multiple the plant’s network, flood- executives in 13 countries last September — nearly searchers said.
points are more vulnerable ing machines with data last year by Cisco Systems double from 2014. Cyberattacks that reach
to malevolent outsiders. and stopping production Inc. found about one out While manufacturers are into industrial control sys-
“These people who try for about four hours, Pe- of four manufacturing or- increasingly prey to these tems have doubled in the
to hack into your net- terson said. Data on some ganizations reported cy- cyber-stickups, it may just past two years in the U.S. to
work know you have a set laptops was lost, but the berattacks that cost them be because criminals are nearly four dozen so far in
schedule. And they know malware was blocked by a money in the previous 12 playing the odds and strik- the federal fiscal year that
hours are meaningful to firewall when it tried to exit months. Since 2015, U.S. ing as many enterprises of ends in September, out-
what you’re doing,” Pe- the plant’s network and put manufacturers considered all types as they can across stripping last year’s total,
terson said in an interview. the hackers’ lock on the “critical” to the economy a targeted region, said according to DHS data.
“There’s only a day and a plant’s computer network. and to normal modern life, John Miller, who heads a “I think the emerging threat
half of inventory in the en- The plant was hit again in like makers of autos and team at cybersecurity firm you’re going to see in the
tire supply chain. And so if April, this time by different aviation parts, have been FireEye that tracks money- future now is really custom
we don’t make our product crooks using new malware the main targets of cyber- driven online threats. ransomware that’s going
in time, that means Toyota designed to hold data or attacks — outstripping en- Attackers “aren’t necessar- to be targeted more to-
doesn’t make their prod- devices hostage to force ergy, communications and ily going after manufactur- ward individual compa-
uct in time, which means a ransom payment, Pe- other critical infrastructure, ing to the exclusion of other nies,” said Neil Hershfield,
they don’t have a car to terson said. The virus was according to Department sectors or with a prefer- the acting director of the
sell on the lot that next day. contained before affect- of Homeland Security in- ence above other sectors. DHS team that handles
It’s that tight.” He said that ing production, and no cident response data. The It’s more that, ‘OK, we’re emergency response to
creates pressure on manu- ransom was paid to either numbers may be imprecise going to try to infect every- cyberattacks on industrial
facturers to make the crimi- group, he said. Manufac- because companies in key body in this country that we control systems.q

Spray can stunt prompts Twitter to act on hateful tweets

By FRANK JORDANS pany’s German headquar- arguing against tough new ging things clearly wasn’t stunt.
Associated Press ters. legislation in Germany, in- enough.” But a video of it received
BERLIN (AP) — An artist tired Shahak Shapira said he sisting it was already taking “I had to spray it on the over 100,000 views in 48
of seeing hateful tweets ig- reported some 300 tweets sufficient measures against ground,” he told The Asso- hours and clearly got the
nored by Twitter has man- containing possible illegal hate speech. ciated Press in a telephone company’s attention. By
aged to get the social content to Twitter over a pe- Shapira said he painted interview Wednesday. Wednesday, Twitter had
network to remove or hide riod of about six months but almost 30 of the offending The Israeli-born artist said deleted three tweets, sus-
some of them — by spray- the social networking site tweets on the street in front he never got any kind of di- pended four accounts and
painting the offending ignored him. This occurred of Twitter’s Hamburg of- rect response from Twitter, withheld another seven ac-
posts in front of the com- at a time when Twitter was fices Friday because “flag- either before or after the counts in Germany.q