Grid Attack Simulation Just Completed: “It was More Severe than Anything We’ve Drilled"

So said the President and COO of AEP subsidiary Southwestern Electric Power Company, of scenario she and her people faced during NERC's second GridEx exercise.

Sounds like NERC CEO Gerry Cauley and his team brewed up something pretty potent this time.  Heck, it even included 7 deaths and 150 casualties ... in quotes of course.

NERC will issue an "after action" report including objectives, what actually happened, lessons learned and recommendations as soon as they get some sleep.  In the meantime, this account from the NY Times Matthew Wald is pretty darn good.  You can check it out HERE.

Photo credit: The Guardian

Because Excercise is Good for US, GridEx II is Coming

In case you've been wondering what kind of shape our North American grid incident response and information sharing system is in, now's your chance to find out.  You can click HERE for more details on what's coming up and register to participate if you're an asset owner one of the other types of orgs that have an official role to play.

• When: 13-14 November
• Where: North America
• Dress: Business Casual

While you're here, here are a few other items of possible interest:

• You can read a decent GridEx II intro HERE, from the NYTimes
• Findings and recommendations from the first GridEx begin on page 10 of the After Action Report
• Click HERE for news on a recent disruptive control system cyber attack on a tunnel traffic system in Israel

Poster image courtesy of Crossfit.com

GridEx 2011: NERC CyberSecurity Exercise is Upon Us

Practice makes perfect ... or at least makes you better.

I mentioned this back in July HERE, now thanks to Dave Dalva of BAH, I can tell you a big exercise is coming up this week, starting tomorrow:

The grid security exercise, scheduled for November 15-17, will test NERC’s and the electricity industry’s crisis response plans, and validate current readiness in response to a cyber incident. The exercise also will serve as an opportunity to enhance collaboration and strengthen industry security processes and capabilities.

Follow this LINK to a bulletin on the exercise as well as a compilation of some of the best grid security presentations I've ever seen, from NERC's recent conference in New Orleans (see Presentations tab at bottom of page).

Results and findings should be available around mid December, and I'll be sure to post material that's cleared for public consumption.