Iran-linked hackers UK power plant infrastructure last month in a cyber attack that the Sunday Telegraph describes as unprecedented, disabling a British facility for four days, according to reports published on Sunday.
Officials have not identified which facility was targeted. It is understood to have been a small site, with little impact on Britain’s wider energy supply.
Iran-linked hackers UK power plant attack: what is known
The attack took place in July, according to Cybersecurity Dive. The four-day outage is the most serious publicly reported intrusion of this kind against UK energy infrastructure.
The Guardian reports the incident represents an apparent escalation by Tehran in its retaliation against the UK over allowing the United States to use British bases.
Iran-linked groups have been active across Western critical infrastructure in recent months. Cybersecurity Dive reports that the same networks of hackers have been targeting vulnerabilities in programmable logic controllers made by Siemens, Rockwell Automation and Schneider Electric, in attacks directed at drinking water and wastewater systems in the United States. The focus on industrial control hardware points to a sustained campaign against physical infrastructure rather than data theft alone.
No group has publicly claimed responsibility for the UK power plant attack. The British government has not commented on the specific facility or attribution.
Housing, Harry and Meghan: the other front pages
Elsewhere in the Sunday papers, the Sunday Times reports that Andy Burnham is to give mayors the power to overrule councils to force through plans for more housing, including tower blocks and skyscrapers. The prime minister is expected to announce the plans this week, the paper says.
The Mail on Sunday reports on a poll it commissioned showing that just 4% of Britons believe the Prince of Wales should make the first move in peace talks with his brother, Prince Harry. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex are due to return to the UK in the coming days.
Both the Mail on Sunday and the Sun on Sunday report that a potential TV role for Meghan in a Guy Ritchie Netflix series has been cancelled. The Sun cites Tina Brown, whom it describes as a ‘showbiz expert’, as claiming the casting offer was withdrawn because of an intense backlash against her in the UK.
The cyber attack on British power infrastructure is expected to prompt renewed scrutiny of the UK’s defences around critical national infrastructure, with the July incident now confirmed as the backdrop to the government’s coming week of domestic policy announcements.
