Investigating Vulnerabilities in Industrial Safety Systems

A mysterious mechanical failure one fateful night in a Saudi Arabian chemical plant leads a cast of operational technology researchers down a strange path towards an uncommon, but grave, threat. In this episode, we hear how these researchers discovered this threat and tried to identify who was responsible for the malware behind it. We also consider how this kind of attack may pose a threat to human life wherever there are manufacturing or public infrastructure facilities around the world.

A big thanks to Julian Gutmanis, Naser Aldossary, Marina Krotofil, and Robert M. Lee for sharing their stories with us.

Sponsors

This episode was sponsored by IT Pro TV. Get 65 hours of free training by visiting ITPro.tv/darknet. And use promo code DARKNET25.

This episode was sponsored by Linode. Linode supplies you with virtual servers. Visit linode.com/darknet and when signing up with a new account use code darknet2020 to get a $20 credit on your next project.

Sources

• https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/04/triton-actor-ttp-profile-custom-attack-tools-detections.html
• https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/12/attackers-deploy-new-ics-attack-framework-triton.html
• https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2018/10/triton-attribution-russian-government-owned-lab-most-likely-built-tools.html
• https://dragos.com/wp-content/uploads/TRISIS-01.pdf
• Video S4 TRITON - Schneider Electric Analysis and Disclosure
• Video S4 TRITON - Mandiant Analysis at S4x18
• Video S4 TRITON - Reverse Engineering the Tricon Controller by Dragos
• Video S4 TRITON - A Report From The Trenches
• Video - Safety Orientation video for the Chemical Plant