No hacking attempt at power grid system by China, Govt

Despite Maharashtra minister's claim that massive power outage in Mumbai last year might have been due to a cyber attack from China was true but the power ministry on Monday denied any data breach in the attempt made by Chinese hackers to target the country's power grid system. Maharashtra Enery Minister Nitin Raut on Monday said New York Times report claiming that the massive power outage in Mumbai  in October last year  might have been due to a cyber attack from China was true. "There is truth in the claims made by NYT. We had formed three committees to inquire into the matter. We will receive a detailed report from the cyber department," Raut said.

The flow of malware was detected by Recorded Future, a Massachusetts-based company that analyses online digital threats. It found that most of the malware was never activated, meaning only a small proportion of malware caused the Mumbai power outage. Since early 2020, Recorded Future's Insikt Group observed a large increase in suspected targeted intrusion activity against Indian organisations from Chinese state-sponsored groups, said the report.

In a statement, the power ministry said, "An email was received from CERT-In on 19th November, 2020 on the threat of malware called Shadow Pad at some control centres of POSOCO. Accordingly, action has been taken to address these threats." It also said that the government took prompt action by blocking all IP addresses and domains listed in NCIIPC mail. All systems in control centres were scanned and cleaned by antivirus, the ministry further said.