"Explosive" cyber attacks in Oil and Gas are life threatening
The focus of most cybersecurity discussions relate to protecting money, reputation and information. Within financial institutions, it is often a threat to personal or company finances. In the telecommunications industry, it is more about personal identity information or intellectual property theft. At a government level, cyber-espionage is a relatively easy and low-cost way to acquire high-value intelligence.
However, the dangers of cyberattacks on physical infrastructure including SCADA (Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition) and ICS (Industrial Control Systems) are very real, growing and frightening, as a recent New York Times article about an attack on a petrochemical company with a plant in Saudi Arabia explains.
Within the Oil and Gas sector, cybersecurity attacks can cause explosions. For a long time, these plants were not connected to networks, but now, in the interests of simplicity of management, they have all been dangerously connected. The probability of these systems being attacked - and successfully so - is now much higher. These applications are NOT designed with security in mind, because, it was not the intention to have them connected to the internet.
The NYT article details an attack that was not designed to simply destroy data, or shut down the plant, but also to sabotage the firm's operations and trigger an explosion that would likely harm other humans. Investigators said the only thing that prevented an explosion was "a mistake in the attackers'computer code", one which they believe the hackers have "probably fixed by now". Investigators believe it is "only a matter of time" before they deploy the same technique against another company successfully.
Software developers are becoming key architects who underpin the success and safety of many public and private organizations. There is no greater example than in the Oil and Gas industry. It is more important than ever that they have a better knowledge of the security implications of their work and that they learn how to code securely, whatever language or frameworks they use.
If you want to see how developers can learn about security to help protect critical infrastructure, play the following challenge:
https://portal.securecodewarrior.com/#/simple-flow/web/injection/oscmd/cpp/vanilla
The only thing that prevented an explosion was a mistake in the attackers'computer code, the investigators said.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/15/technology/saudi-arabia-hacks-cyberattacks.html
The cyberassault was not designed to simply destroy data or shut down the plant, investigators believe. It was meant to trigger an explosion. https://t.co/kQqcAhoW01
" The New York Times (@nytimes) March 15, 2018
A Cyberattack in Saudi Arabia Had a Deadly Goal. Experts Fear Another Try. https://t.co/q9UdicR7dv
" Colin Wright (@colinismyname) March 22, 2018
The attack was a dangerous escalation in international hacking, as faceless enemies demonstrated both the drive and the ability to inflict serious physical damage. https://t.co/G8bBCteouZ#CyberSecurity #NetworkMonitoring
" Elitery Indonesia (@eliterydc) March 22, 2018
A recent failed #cyberassault on a Saudi Arabian petrochemical company had a deadly goal. This @NYTimes article explains more: https://t.co/3g8oDuPijm pic.twitter.com/MfSqrXSd9u
" Symantec EMEA (@SymantecEMEA) March 21, 2018
The only thing that prevented an explosion was a mistake in the attackers computer code, the investigators said.
Matias Madou, Ph.D. is a security expert, researcher, and CTO and co-founder of Secure Code Warrior. Matias obtained his Ph.D. in Application Security from Ghent University, focusing on static analysis solutions. He later joined Fortify in the US, where he realized that it was insufficient to solely detect code problems without aiding developers in writing secure code. This inspired him to develop products that assist developers, alleviate the burden of security, and exceed customers' expectations. When he is not at his desk as part of Team Awesome, he enjoys being on stage presenting at conferences including RSA Conference, BlackHat and DefCon.
Secure Code Warrior is here for your organization to help you secure code across the entire software development lifecycle and create a culture in which cybersecurity is top of mind. Whether you’re an AppSec Manager, Developer, CISO, or anyone involved in security, we can help your organization reduce risks associated with insecure code.
Book a demo
Matias Madou, Ph.D. is a security expert, researcher, and CTO and co-founder of Secure Code Warrior. Matias obtained his Ph.D. in Application Security from Ghent University, focusing on static analysis solutions. He later joined Fortify in the US, where he realized that it was insufficient to solely detect code problems without aiding developers in writing secure code. This inspired him to develop products that assist developers, alleviate the burden of security, and exceed customers' expectations. When he is not at his desk as part of Team Awesome, he enjoys being on stage presenting at conferences including RSA Conference, BlackHat and DefCon.
Matias is a researcher and developer with more than 15 years of hands-on software security experience. He has developed solutions for companies such as Fortify Software and his own company Sensei Security. Over his career, Matias has led multiple application security research projects which have led to commercial products and boasts over 10 patents under his belt. When he is away from his desk, Matias has served as an instructor for advanced application security training courses and regularly speaks at global conferences including RSA Conference, Black Hat, DefCon, BSIMM, OWASP AppSec and BruCon.
Matias holds a Ph.D. in Computer Engineering from Ghent University, where he studied application security through program obfuscation to hide the inner workings of an application.
The focus of most cybersecurity discussions relate to protecting money, reputation and information. Within financial institutions, it is often a threat to personal or company finances. In the telecommunications industry, it is more about personal identity information or intellectual property theft. At a government level, cyber-espionage is a relatively easy and low-cost way to acquire high-value intelligence.
However, the dangers of cyberattacks on physical infrastructure including SCADA (Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition) and ICS (Industrial Control Systems) are very real, growing and frightening, as a recent New York Times article about an attack on a petrochemical company with a plant in Saudi Arabia explains.
Within the Oil and Gas sector, cybersecurity attacks can cause explosions. For a long time, these plants were not connected to networks, but now, in the interests of simplicity of management, they have all been dangerously connected. The probability of these systems being attacked - and successfully so - is now much higher. These applications are NOT designed with security in mind, because, it was not the intention to have them connected to the internet.
The NYT article details an attack that was not designed to simply destroy data, or shut down the plant, but also to sabotage the firm's operations and trigger an explosion that would likely harm other humans. Investigators said the only thing that prevented an explosion was "a mistake in the attackers'computer code", one which they believe the hackers have "probably fixed by now". Investigators believe it is "only a matter of time" before they deploy the same technique against another company successfully.
Software developers are becoming key architects who underpin the success and safety of many public and private organizations. There is no greater example than in the Oil and Gas industry. It is more important than ever that they have a better knowledge of the security implications of their work and that they learn how to code securely, whatever language or frameworks they use.
If you want to see how developers can learn about security to help protect critical infrastructure, play the following challenge:
https://portal.securecodewarrior.com/#/simple-flow/web/injection/oscmd/cpp/vanilla
The only thing that prevented an explosion was a mistake in the attackers'computer code, the investigators said.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/15/technology/saudi-arabia-hacks-cyberattacks.html
The cyberassault was not designed to simply destroy data or shut down the plant, investigators believe. It was meant to trigger an explosion. https://t.co/kQqcAhoW01
" The New York Times (@nytimes) March 15, 2018
A Cyberattack in Saudi Arabia Had a Deadly Goal. Experts Fear Another Try. https://t.co/q9UdicR7dv
" Colin Wright (@colinismyname) March 22, 2018
The attack was a dangerous escalation in international hacking, as faceless enemies demonstrated both the drive and the ability to inflict serious physical damage. https://t.co/G8bBCteouZ#CyberSecurity #NetworkMonitoring
" Elitery Indonesia (@eliterydc) March 22, 2018
A recent failed #cyberassault on a Saudi Arabian petrochemical company had a deadly goal. This @NYTimes article explains more: https://t.co/3g8oDuPijm pic.twitter.com/MfSqrXSd9u
" Symantec EMEA (@SymantecEMEA) March 21, 2018
The focus of most cybersecurity discussions relate to protecting money, reputation and information. Within financial institutions, it is often a threat to personal or company finances. In the telecommunications industry, it is more about personal identity information or intellectual property theft. At a government level, cyber-espionage is a relatively easy and low-cost way to acquire high-value intelligence.
However, the dangers of cyberattacks on physical infrastructure including SCADA (Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition) and ICS (Industrial Control Systems) are very real, growing and frightening, as a recent New York Times article about an attack on a petrochemical company with a plant in Saudi Arabia explains.
Within the Oil and Gas sector, cybersecurity attacks can cause explosions. For a long time, these plants were not connected to networks, but now, in the interests of simplicity of management, they have all been dangerously connected. The probability of these systems being attacked - and successfully so - is now much higher. These applications are NOT designed with security in mind, because, it was not the intention to have them connected to the internet.
The NYT article details an attack that was not designed to simply destroy data, or shut down the plant, but also to sabotage the firm's operations and trigger an explosion that would likely harm other humans. Investigators said the only thing that prevented an explosion was "a mistake in the attackers'computer code", one which they believe the hackers have "probably fixed by now". Investigators believe it is "only a matter of time" before they deploy the same technique against another company successfully.
Software developers are becoming key architects who underpin the success and safety of many public and private organizations. There is no greater example than in the Oil and Gas industry. It is more important than ever that they have a better knowledge of the security implications of their work and that they learn how to code securely, whatever language or frameworks they use.
If you want to see how developers can learn about security to help protect critical infrastructure, play the following challenge:
https://portal.securecodewarrior.com/#/simple-flow/web/injection/oscmd/cpp/vanilla
The only thing that prevented an explosion was a mistake in the attackers'computer code, the investigators said.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/15/technology/saudi-arabia-hacks-cyberattacks.html
The cyberassault was not designed to simply destroy data or shut down the plant, investigators believe. It was meant to trigger an explosion. https://t.co/kQqcAhoW01
" The New York Times (@nytimes) March 15, 2018
A Cyberattack in Saudi Arabia Had a Deadly Goal. Experts Fear Another Try. https://t.co/q9UdicR7dv
" Colin Wright (@colinismyname) March 22, 2018
The attack was a dangerous escalation in international hacking, as faceless enemies demonstrated both the drive and the ability to inflict serious physical damage. https://t.co/G8bBCteouZ#CyberSecurity #NetworkMonitoring
" Elitery Indonesia (@eliterydc) March 22, 2018
A recent failed #cyberassault on a Saudi Arabian petrochemical company had a deadly goal. This @NYTimes article explains more: https://t.co/3g8oDuPijm pic.twitter.com/MfSqrXSd9u
" Symantec EMEA (@SymantecEMEA) March 21, 2018
Click on the link below and download the PDF of this resource.
Secure Code Warrior is here for your organization to help you secure code across the entire software development lifecycle and create a culture in which cybersecurity is top of mind. Whether you’re an AppSec Manager, Developer, CISO, or anyone involved in security, we can help your organization reduce risks associated with insecure code.
View reportBook a demo
Matias Madou, Ph.D. is a security expert, researcher, and CTO and co-founder of Secure Code Warrior. Matias obtained his Ph.D. in Application Security from Ghent University, focusing on static analysis solutions. He later joined Fortify in the US, where he realized that it was insufficient to solely detect code problems without aiding developers in writing secure code. This inspired him to develop products that assist developers, alleviate the burden of security, and exceed customers' expectations. When he is not at his desk as part of Team Awesome, he enjoys being on stage presenting at conferences including RSA Conference, BlackHat and DefCon.
Matias is a researcher and developer with more than 15 years of hands-on software security experience. He has developed solutions for companies such as Fortify Software and his own company Sensei Security. Over his career, Matias has led multiple application security research projects which have led to commercial products and boasts over 10 patents under his belt. When he is away from his desk, Matias has served as an instructor for advanced application security training courses and regularly speaks at global conferences including RSA Conference, Black Hat, DefCon, BSIMM, OWASP AppSec and BruCon.
Matias holds a Ph.D. in Computer Engineering from Ghent University, where he studied application security through program obfuscation to hide the inner workings of an application.
The focus of most cybersecurity discussions relate to protecting money, reputation and information. Within financial institutions, it is often a threat to personal or company finances. In the telecommunications industry, it is more about personal identity information or intellectual property theft. At a government level, cyber-espionage is a relatively easy and low-cost way to acquire high-value intelligence.
However, the dangers of cyberattacks on physical infrastructure including SCADA (Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition) and ICS (Industrial Control Systems) are very real, growing and frightening, as a recent New York Times article about an attack on a petrochemical company with a plant in Saudi Arabia explains.
Within the Oil and Gas sector, cybersecurity attacks can cause explosions. For a long time, these plants were not connected to networks, but now, in the interests of simplicity of management, they have all been dangerously connected. The probability of these systems being attacked - and successfully so - is now much higher. These applications are NOT designed with security in mind, because, it was not the intention to have them connected to the internet.
The NYT article details an attack that was not designed to simply destroy data, or shut down the plant, but also to sabotage the firm's operations and trigger an explosion that would likely harm other humans. Investigators said the only thing that prevented an explosion was "a mistake in the attackers'computer code", one which they believe the hackers have "probably fixed by now". Investigators believe it is "only a matter of time" before they deploy the same technique against another company successfully.
Software developers are becoming key architects who underpin the success and safety of many public and private organizations. There is no greater example than in the Oil and Gas industry. It is more important than ever that they have a better knowledge of the security implications of their work and that they learn how to code securely, whatever language or frameworks they use.
If you want to see how developers can learn about security to help protect critical infrastructure, play the following challenge:
https://portal.securecodewarrior.com/#/simple-flow/web/injection/oscmd/cpp/vanilla
The only thing that prevented an explosion was a mistake in the attackers'computer code, the investigators said.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/15/technology/saudi-arabia-hacks-cyberattacks.html
The cyberassault was not designed to simply destroy data or shut down the plant, investigators believe. It was meant to trigger an explosion. https://t.co/kQqcAhoW01
" The New York Times (@nytimes) March 15, 2018
A Cyberattack in Saudi Arabia Had a Deadly Goal. Experts Fear Another Try. https://t.co/q9UdicR7dv
" Colin Wright (@colinismyname) March 22, 2018
The attack was a dangerous escalation in international hacking, as faceless enemies demonstrated both the drive and the ability to inflict serious physical damage. https://t.co/G8bBCteouZ#CyberSecurity #NetworkMonitoring
" Elitery Indonesia (@eliterydc) March 22, 2018
A recent failed #cyberassault on a Saudi Arabian petrochemical company had a deadly goal. This @NYTimes article explains more: https://t.co/3g8oDuPijm pic.twitter.com/MfSqrXSd9u
" Symantec EMEA (@SymantecEMEA) March 21, 2018
Table of contents
Matias Madou, Ph.D. is a security expert, researcher, and CTO and co-founder of Secure Code Warrior. Matias obtained his Ph.D. in Application Security from Ghent University, focusing on static analysis solutions. He later joined Fortify in the US, where he realized that it was insufficient to solely detect code problems without aiding developers in writing secure code. This inspired him to develop products that assist developers, alleviate the burden of security, and exceed customers' expectations. When he is not at his desk as part of Team Awesome, he enjoys being on stage presenting at conferences including RSA Conference, BlackHat and DefCon.
Secure Code Warrior is here for your organization to help you secure code across the entire software development lifecycle and create a culture in which cybersecurity is top of mind. Whether you’re an AppSec Manager, Developer, CISO, or anyone involved in security, we can help your organization reduce risks associated with insecure code.
Book a demoDownloadResources to get you started
Secure by Design: Defining Best Practices, Enabling Developers and Benchmarking Preventative Security Outcomes
In this research paper, Secure Code Warrior co-founders, Pieter Danhieux and Dr. Matias Madou, Ph.D., along with expert contributors, Chris Inglis, Former US National Cyber Director (now Strategic Advisor to Paladin Capital Group), and Devin Lynch, Senior Director, Paladin Global Institute, will reveal key findings from over twenty in-depth interviews with enterprise security leaders including CISOs, a VP of Application Security, and software security professionals.
Benchmarking Security Skills: Streamlining Secure-by-Design in the Enterprise
Finding meaningful data on the success of Secure-by-Design initiatives is notoriously difficult. CISOs are often challenged when attempting to prove the return on investment (ROI) and business value of security program activities at both the people and company levels. Not to mention, it’s particularly difficult for enterprises to gain insights into how their organizations are benchmarked against current industry standards. The President’s National Cybersecurity Strategy challenged stakeholders to “embrace security and resilience by design.” The key to making Secure-by-Design initiatives work is not only giving developers the skills to ensure secure code, but also assuring the regulators that those skills are in place. In this presentation, we share a myriad of qualitative and quantitative data, derived from multiple primary sources, including internal data points collected from over 250,000 developers, data-driven customer insights, and public studies. Leveraging this aggregation of data points, we aim to communicate a vision of the current state of Secure-by-Design initiatives across multiple verticals. The report details why this space is currently underutilized, the significant impact a successful upskilling program can have on cybersecurity risk mitigation, and the potential to eliminate categories of vulnerabilities from a codebase.
Secure code training topics & content
Our industry-leading content is always evolving to fit the ever changing software development landscape with your role in mind. Topics covering everything from AI to XQuery Injection, offered for a variety of roles from Architects and Engineers to Product Managers and QA. Get a sneak peak of what our content catalog has to offer by topic and role.
Resources to get you started
Revealed: How the Cyber Industry Defines Secure by Design
In our latest white paper, our Co-Founders, Pieter Danhieux and Dr. Matias Madou, Ph.D., sat down with over twenty enterprise security leaders, including CISOs, AppSec leaders and security professionals, to figure out the key pieces of this puzzle and uncover the reality behind the Secure by Design movement. It’s a shared ambition across the security teams, but no shared playbook.
Is Vibe Coding Going to Turn Your Codebase Into a Frat Party?
Vibe coding is like a college frat party, and AI is the centerpiece of all the festivities, the keg. It’s a lot of fun to let loose, get creative, and see where your imagination can take you, but after a few keg stands, drinking (or, using AI) in moderation is undoubtedly the safer long-term solution.
Developer-driven coding.
Securely.
Contact us today and make software security an intrinsic part of your development process.
