Illinois water plant 'hack' was denied by FBI and DHS and later proved a false alarm

Earlier this month, a pump failure at an Illinois water plant was blamed on Russian hackers, but the FBI and DHS found no evidence to support a security breach. Now Wired has dug into the case and found the whole hacking scare was much ado about nothing.

The story starts with Jim Mimlitz, who helped set up the Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) systems at the Illinois facility and occasionally provided technical support. While on vacation in Russia, he received a call on his cellphone seeking advice and logged in to examine some data records; he didn't tell the caller where he was.

Following a report last week that an Illinois water plant was hacked, both the Department of Homeland Security and the FBI have issued a statement saying that the report was false. The report came from security expert Joe Weiss, who contended that the control system for the plant was compromised, equipment was damaged, and that the hack originated in Russia. At the time, the DHS and FBI confirmed that equipment was damaged, but would not confirm that it was a result of a hack. Today, they are denying it, according to a statement received by Jeffrey Carr:

Weiss, meanwhile, maintains that his original report was based on information that came from the Illinois State Terrorism and Intelligence Center (STIC), and raises concerns that different government agencies are releasing conflicting reports on the incident. While those reports may be conflicting, there's a growing consensus that the industry isn't adequately prepared for a hacking attack.