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Securityintelligence
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Are attackers already embedded in U.S. critical infrastructure networks?
- The threat of cyberattacks against critical infrastructure in the United States has evolved beyond data theft and espionage. Intruders are already entrenched in the nation’s most vital systems, waiting to unleash attacks.
- Pre-positioning tactic allows cyber actors to infiltrate systems, maintain persistence and potentially launch massively destructive operations.
- Volt Typhoon, a state-sponsored hacking group, has infiltrated critical infrastructure networks. They have targeted infrastructure that millions of Americans depend on daily, and their methodical approach has allowed them to infiltrate U.S. systems for extended periods without detection.
- The FOCAL Plan: the Federal Civilian Executive Branch (FCEB) Operational Cybersecurity Alignment Plan developed by CISA aims to shore up federal cybersecurity defenses by driving coordinated action across agencies to defend against pre-positioning and other sophisticated cyber threats.
- The FOCAL Plan focuses on five critical areas: asset management, vulnerability management, defensible architecture, cyber supply chain risk management, and incident detection and response.
- The threat landscape outlined by Volt Typhoon’s actions calls for an urgent response from every organization that operates critical infrastructure.
- The harsh reality is that many organizations may already have pre-positioned attackers within their networks. The objective now is to limit the damage they can do and to ensure that attackers cannot trigger even more widespread disruption.
- The presence of cyber actors like Volt Typhoon in U.S. critical infrastructure is not hypothetical — it’s happening now.
- The FOCAL Plan is a step in the right direction, but the fight against pre-positioned cyber actors is far from over; it will require a sustained, coordinated effort.
- The FOCAL Plan provides a framework, but it is up to individual organizations to implement these measures at every level.
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