Water System Hacked by Anti-Israel Activists

Three Pennsylvania lawmakers are pushing for a federal investigation into how foreign hackers breached a water system near Pittsburgh and caused the nation’s top cybersecurity agency to warn other water treatment utilities of vulnerabilities.

Sens. John Fetterman (D-PA), Bob Casey (D-PA), and Rep. Chris Deluzio (D-PA) wrote to Attorney General Merrick Garland this week urging action after the Municipal Water Authority of Aliquippa was compromised on Nov. 24.

“Any attack on our nation’s critical infrastructure is unacceptable,” the lawmakers wrote in Thursday’s letter. “If a hack like this can happen here in western Pennsylvania, it can happen anywhere else in the United States.”

Federal authorities told Casey’s office they think the operation was conducted by Cyber Av3ngers, an Iranian-linked cyber group looking to disrupt Israeli-made technology in the United States. Check Point Software, an American-Israeli leading cyber security company, identified Cyber Av3ngers as an “Iranian government-affiliated hacktivist group” focused on Israeli targets of “critical infrastructure in areas of electricity, transportation and water supply.” (Excerpt from the Washington Examiner.)