Cybersecurity: FBI warns Russian hackers are found scanning US energy networks

*The United States’ FBI Cyber Division says it considers the Russia’s state-sponsored hacking to be ‘a serious threat’ to the American country

Gbenga Kayode | ConsumerConnect

A top official of the United States’ Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has warned that Russian hackers’ scanning networks of energy firms in the American country is posing a “very real” threat to the national security of the US.

It was learnt Bryan Vorndran, an Assistant Director in the FBI’s Cyber Division, recently considered the Russia’s state-sponsored hacking to be a serious threat to the US.

Vorndran, who disclosed this development during a hearing before a US House of Representatives panel, said: “The threat from Russia in a criminal sense, in the nation state sense, is very, very real – and current.”

He stated that the increase in “scanning activity,” with Russian hackers scanning the networks of the US energy firms to learn more about existing vulnerabilities and protections in place, Reuters report said.

The FBI official also suggested that Russia is “one of the two most capable cyberadversaries we face globally” and a “formidable foe.”

The White House, last week, was said to have proposed its $5.8trillion budget plan for 2023, seeking $10.9billion for civilian cybersecurity funding, following continuous warnings of potential cyberattacks from Russia.

Recall during the Geneva Summit 2021, US President Joe Biden told Russian President Vladimir Putin that certain critical infrastructure should be “off-limits” to cyberattacks, focusing on ‘destructive’ hacks aimed at 16 types of infrastructure.

However, Vorndran commented that hacks against critical sectors – after all – did take place.

“There are compromises against some of those 16 critical infrastructure sectors. I can’t speak specifically to which ones,” the FBI chief noted.