WASHINGTON, D.C. – In remarks delivered on the Senate floor today, U.S. Senator Angus King (I-Maine), a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, urged his colleagues to heed the repeated warnings of Intelligence Community officials and move to protect America’s critical energy infrastructure from potential cyber-attacks. Senator King’s comments came one day after he introduced the Securing Energy Infrastructure Act of 2016, bipartisan legislation that would protect our electric grid from these types of attacks by exploring ways to replace some computer-based technology with analog or manual systems to act as safeguards against hackers and other cyber adversaries.

          “I have heard repeated warnings from every public official involved with intelligence and national security that an attack on our critical infrastructure is not [only] possible – it is likely. How many shots across our bow, how many warning shots do we have to endure? Sony, the OPM, insurance companies, and now the nightmare scenario of an electric grid attack,” said Senator King. “I do not want to be here on a darkening winter afternoon and see the lights going off across America – the power to hospitals, the power to our transportation system, the power that makes our lives what [they are] today. This is not an abstract threat; we know from Ukraine that the capability exists to do exactly this and take down the grid. We must act expeditiously and directly to counteract that threat. If we do not do so, we are failing our responsibility to the people of America, to our constituents, and to the United States. So I urge rapid consideration of this bill.”

Top officials within the Intelligence Community have testified that U.S. critical infrastructure are enticing targets to malicious actors. Those officials have also warned that, without action, the U.S. remains vulnerable to cyber-attacks that could result in catastrophic damage to public health and safety, economic security, and national security.

Yesterday, Senator King was joined by Senators Jim Risch (R-Idaho), Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.), and Susan Collins (R-Maine), all fellow members of the Senate Intelligence Committee, in introducing the Securing Energy Infrastructure Act of 2016. This bill would examine solutions to defend the U.S. energy grid by replacing key devices like computer-connected operating systems that are vulnerable to cyber-attacks with analog and human-operated systems – a “retro” approach that has shown promise as a safeguard against cyber-attacks.

In his remarks today, Senator King referenced a December 2015 cyber-attack on Ukraine’s power grid as an example of the possible damage these attacks could inflict here at home. In that 2015 attack, sophisticated cyber-attack techniques were used to plunge more than 225,000 people into darkness. The attack in Ukraine could have been worse if not for the fact that the country relies on manual technology to operate its grid. Senator King’s bill seeks to build on this concept by studying ways to strategically use “retro” technology to isolate our grid’s most important control systems.

          “We can learn something from what happened in Ukraine, and there is a piece of good news and a lesson for us. […] One of the reasons they were able to get the power back on so fast was because the Ukrainian grid was not up to modern practices in terms of its interconnectedness and its digitization,” said Senator King. “There were old-fashioned analogue switches and the most old-fashioned analog switch of all, a human being, that could actually throw breakers and get the system back online. […] It may be that going back to the future, if you will, going back to the past and simplifying some of these critical connection points may be the best protection that we can have.” 

The video of Senator King’s full floor remarks is available HERE.

To read the text of Senator King’s legislation, click HERE.

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