4 ms·

Are pipelines something we invented after the internet? Have we lost the knowledge we used to support infrastructure before the 90s?

fennecfoxen 5y ago
Before the 90s? Hmm. Well, if you believe Thomas C. Reed's account, the US was using trojans to sabotage Soviet oil pipelines in 1982.
- SkyMarshal 5y ago
  Is that the one when the CIA got wind of a Soviet industrial espionage operation, and seeded it with a legit-looking but subtly flawed schematic, which the Soviets ended up actually building to spec, and it exploded shortly after? That wasn't an internet trojan, fyi.
  - fennecfoxen 5y ago
    According to the story, this was some Canadian pipeline control equipment or software which the USSR purchased from some Canadians, but the CIA modified the software somehow before it was delivered. A supply-chain attack on a computer system. I understand there's nonzero doubt as to the credibility of this story.
    - ctoth 5y ago
      I'm currently reading The Dead Hand, and I think this matches what you're talking about: > Rather than roll up the Line X officers and expel them, Reagan approved a secret plan to exploit the Farewell dossier for economic warfare against the Soviet Union. The plan was to secretly feed the Line X officers with technology rigged to self-destruct after a certain interval. The idea came from Weiss, who approached Casey, who took it to Reagan. The CIA worked with American industry to alter products to be slipped to the KGB, matching the KGB’s shopping list. “Contrived computer chips found their way into Soviet military equipment, flawed turbines were installed on a gas pipeline, and defective plans disturbed the output of chemical plants and a tractor factory,” Weiss said. “The Pentagon introduced misleading information pertinent to stealth aircraft, space defense, and tactical aircraft.” > Oil and gas equipment was at the top of the Soviet wish list, and the Soviets needed sophisticated control systems to automate the valves, compressors and storage facilities for a huge new pipeline to Europe. When the pipeline technology could not be purchased in the United States, the KGB shopped it from a Canadian firm. However, tipped by Vetrov, the CIA rigged the software sold from Canada to go haywire after a while, to reset pump speeds and valve settings to create pressures far beyond those acceptable to the pipeline joints and welds. One day, the system exploded. “The result was the most monumental non-nuclear explosion and fire ever seen from space,” Reed recalled. The blast was starting to trigger worried looks in the U.S. government that day, he recalled, when, at the National Security Council, “Gus Weiss came down the hall to tell his fellow NSC staffers not to worry.” The explosion had been one of the first fruits of the Reagan confrontation.
    - kingsuper20 5y ago
      Interesting, it's not unlike the Crypto AG story. It's funny how upset the US public can get about any perceived incursions by the Russians (sometimes true, often not) when you consider the country's own history.
- jeswin 5y ago
  There's a big difference between the capabilities of a criminal organization (like the one involved here) and that of a nation state. Such attacks are also responded to differently, and it's not going to be send some Bitcoin to this address.

fennecfoxen 5y ago

Before the 90s? Hmm. Well, if you believe Thomas C. Reed's account, the US was using trojans to sabotage Soviet oil pipelines in 1982.

SkyMarshal 5y ago
Is that the one when the CIA got wind of a Soviet industrial espionage operation, and seeded it with a legit-looking but subtly flawed schematic, which the Soviets ended up actually building to spec, and it exploded shortly after? That wasn't an internet trojan, fyi.
- fennecfoxen 5y ago
  According to the story, this was some Canadian pipeline control equipment or software which the USSR purchased from some Canadians, but the CIA modified the software somehow before it was delivered. A supply-chain attack on a computer system. I understand there's nonzero doubt as to the credibility of this story.
  - ctoth 5y ago
    I'm currently reading The Dead Hand, and I think this matches what you're talking about: > Rather than roll up the Line X officers and expel them, Reagan approved a secret plan to exploit the Farewell dossier for economic warfare against the Soviet Union. The plan was to secretly feed the Line X officers with technology rigged to self-destruct after a certain interval. The idea came from Weiss, who approached Casey, who took it to Reagan. The CIA worked with American industry to alter products to be slipped to the KGB, matching the KGB’s shopping list. “Contrived computer chips found their way into Soviet military equipment, flawed turbines were installed on a gas pipeline, and defective plans disturbed the output of chemical plants and a tractor factory,” Weiss said. “The Pentagon introduced misleading information pertinent to stealth aircraft, space defense, and tactical aircraft.” > Oil and gas equipment was at the top of the Soviet wish list, and the Soviets needed sophisticated control systems to automate the valves, compressors and storage facilities for a huge new pipeline to Europe. When the pipeline technology could not be purchased in the United States, the KGB shopped it from a Canadian firm. However, tipped by Vetrov, the CIA rigged the software sold from Canada to go haywire after a while, to reset pump speeds and valve settings to create pressures far beyond those acceptable to the pipeline joints and welds. One day, the system exploded. “The result was the most monumental non-nuclear explosion and fire ever seen from space,” Reed recalled. The blast was starting to trigger worried looks in the U.S. government that day, he recalled, when, at the National Security Council, “Gus Weiss came down the hall to tell his fellow NSC staffers not to worry.” The explosion had been one of the first fruits of the Reagan confrontation.
  - kingsuper20 5y ago
    Interesting, it's not unlike the Crypto AG story. It's funny how upset the US public can get about any perceived incursions by the Russians (sometimes true, often not) when you consider the country's own history.
jeswin 5y ago
There's a big difference between the capabilities of a criminal organization (like the one involved here) and that of a nation state. Such attacks are also responded to differently, and it's not going to be send some Bitcoin to this address.