Iranian hackers’ targeting of US critical infrastructure has escalated since start of war, U.S. says

Iranian hacking campaigns targeting equipment used across multiple ​U.S. critical infrastructure sectors are escalating in response ‌to hostilities, U.S. cybersecurity, law enforcement ​and intelligence agencies said ⁠on Tuesday.

The hackers are targeting publicly exposed programmable logic controllers and supervisory control and data acquisition displays, ‌according to the advisory.

The targeted devices are used to interact with ‌or control certain critical infrastructure-related equipment ‌and ⁠systems, the advisory said.

The ⁠hackers are seeking to cause “disruptive effects within the United States,” according to the advisory. “In a few ​cases, this activity has ‌resulted in operational disruption and financial loss.”

In some cases the hackers interacted ‌with data files in the systems to alter display data, while also extracting device project data, according to the advisory.

The hacking operations targeted unnamed critical infrastructure organisations in the government ‌services and facilities, water and wastewater systems and ​energy sectors, according to the advisory.

The advisory was issued by the FBI, ⁠the National Security Agency, the Cybersecurity and ⁠Infrastructure Security Agency, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of Energy and ‌U.S. Cyber Command’s Cyber National Mission Force.