Russian Hackers May Have Targeted US Nuclear Power Plants, Reports Say

Nearly a dozen companies operating nuclear power plants across the United States may have been targeted by hackers working for a foreign government, probably Russia, in the last few weeks, multiple reports said Thursday.

The hackers’ bid to penetrate the computer networks of the companies — including Wolf Creek Nuclear Operating Corporation in Kansas — may be an act of cyber espionage, or an attempt to disrupt the country’s power supply. In a joint report published last week by the Department of Homeland Security and FBI, the government agencies warned about the hacking attempts, according to the New York Times that claims to have access to the report. Hackers may have sent fake resumes in targeted emails to senior officials in these organizations, the Times report claimed. The government report carried an amber warning, the second-highest rating for the sensitivity of the threat. It is not clear how many facilities were breached.

However, the government agencies reportedly stated Thursday there was no current threat to public.

While the Times said the origin of hackers was unknown, Bloomberg reported the chief suspect of the attacks being carried out since May is Russia. The news outlet confirmed the Russia connection citing details from three government officials familiar to the matter.

The possible links of the hackers to Russia can be worrying at a time when the investigation into Moscow’s meddling into the presidential elections is deepening. President Donald Trump said Thursday Russia may have interfered in the U.S. elections. "I think it was Russia and I think it could have been other people and other countries. Could have been a lot of people [who] interfered,” he said at a news conference in Warsaw ahead of the G-20 summit in Hamburg.

Russian President Vladimir Putin also conceded in June that hackers from Russia may have been involved in the election hacking. He called such hackers “patriotic," however, he denied allegations about the involvement of government.

A Department of Homeland Security official also told the Congress in June that 21 election systems in the country were targeted in last year’s presidential elections race. "As of right now, we have evidence that election-related systems in 21 states were targeted,” Jeanette Manfra, the department's acting deputy undersecretary of cyber security, was quoted as saying.

Underlining the pattern of such attempts, Mike McFaul, the former U.S. ambassador to Russia, recently said: "For years now, the Kremlin has looked for ways to disrupt democracies, to help the people that they like to come to power and to undermine the credibility of the democratic process.”

The speculations about the current hacking attempts to damage the power infrastructure in the U.S. are a reminder of Ukraine's power grid failure in December 2015. Nearly 80,000 residents of western Ukraine were affected when cyber attacks on power grids triggered outages. The Ukrainian government held Russian security services responsible for the incident.