I get that maybe on a long shot the spamming program took out mobile networks for about a few minutes. What was this 'virus' shutting down power though? No power station would shut down because of a defective computer system! - surely a complete failure of the computer system is planned for as routine?
The black guys spamming program was just his "*beep* you" to the world for his suicide. The dumb ass woman hacking into his personal computer and leaving the backdoor she used to get in wide open let whatever unnamed terrorists get their hands on the infrastructure destabilizing program he had been working on for the government.
These types of things are real and are being developed. It's the not the power stations themselves that are the targets, it's the computer controlled sub-stations which control where power is set on the system and how much. These are all controlled by computer command from central dispatching centers run by the power companies. Someone getting into these remote control systems and just telling the system to switch to "OFF" is a legitimate possibility.
Ah, OK, I hadn't considered that 'down the line' thing, thanks for the reply.
I still think that due to even the potential of simple computer failure, there must be some manual backup of these sub stations and power allocation that would mean at least minimal essential services were kept up.
I still think that due to even the potential of simple computer failure, there must be some manual backup of these sub stations
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What the spammer did is something which happens multiple times every day. It's called a DDOS attack, where you overload a target system. So yes, take down some comms ISPs for an hour or day maybe.
Re power failure, the realistic likelihood in large complex targets like power stations is not computer failure, but rather computer malfunction where the rogue program causes key equipment to damage the installation.
This however is unlikely to be doable by any loners or small groups like terrorists. It would need the resources of a large corporation or nation to develop such a weapon.
A good example is the [presumed] US infection of the Iranian nuclear facility a couple of years ago, which caused significant damage to key elements [Siemens equipment iirc]. There is also a lot of suggestion that China has been probing and testing high-grade infiltration.
I expect US and China will quietly agree to back off each other, sort of like the MAD stalemate between US and USSR last century. Perhaps even agree to mutually police smaller, less controlled countries that might think about getting frisky--eg North Korea, Israel.