British Nuclear Power Facility Attacked

Uploaded on 2023-12-06 in INTELLIGENCE-Hot Spots-Russia, FREE TO VIEW, BUSINESS-Production-Energy

Britain’s oldest and most vulnerable nuclear power plant, Sellafield, might have been hacked into by cyber groups closely linked to Russia and/ or China it has been claimed by The Guardian newspaper.

The newspaper claims the plant has come under cyber attack by groups closely linked to the two nations, although the plant itseld says it is not aware that it has been hacked.

Sellafield (pictured) is located on the coast in Cumbria, is a former power station that now processes nuclear waste from across Britain. The site has the largest store of plutonium on the planet and is a repository for nuclear waste from weapons programmes and decades of nuclear power generation.

Sellafield's managemnet are said to be unaware when the site was first hacked, but came across sleeper malware, which can be used to spy or attack systems, as far back as 2015. It is not clear if this malware is still present in computer systems, with its existence allegedly covered up by senior staff.

In 2018 a nuclear power sation in Germany was found to have been infected with computer viruses. Built more than 70 years ago the Sellafield site is no longer used for power generation and has been used to make plutonium for nuclear weapons and has also taken in radioactive waste from other countries for reprocessing.

The Guardian's investigation suggests the Sellafirld management do not know exactly when the IT systems were first compromised. But sources said breaches were first detected in 2015, when experts realised sleeper malware, software that can be used to spy or attack systems, had been embedded in the plant’s computer networks. It is not known if the malicious software has been removed, raising concerns about the leakage of sensitive and important information.

In response to the newspaper report,the UK government has said there is no records or evidence to suggest that networks at the Sellafield nuclear site were the victim of a successful cyber attack by state actors.

Espionage by Russia and China are among the biggest threats to the UK, according to government security officials and the most recent National Risk Register, an official document that outlines the key hazards the UK could face, includes a cyber-attack on civil nuclear infrastructure.

Guardian: SellafiledLtd Gov.UK: Gov.UK: Energy Live: Reuters: GBNews: ITV: Mail:

Images: @SellafiedUK & moneycortex

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