A few years ago, DHS and DOE set up a test power plant using similar equipment to what is actually in widespread production use, and invited select hackers to see what they could do to it.<p>Here are the results: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=fJyWngDco3g" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=fJyWngDco3g</a><p>There was some discussion of this on the excellent Nova episode &quot;Rise Of The Hackers&quot;, where they mentioned that the damage to the generator was extensive enough that it would not be just a quick in place repair. It would have to be replaced, which could take months (they don&#x27;t have these things lying around in stock...). If someone did a successful coordinated attack on several power plants, it quite possibly could knock a very large number of people off the grid for many months.<p>We need to stop allowing this. If this trend of putting everything online without paying serious attention to security continues, two things <i>are</i> going to happen:<p>1. The bad guys are going to succeed at some point in causing a major disaster. If we are lucky it will just cause widespread economic loss and inconvenience. More likely, though, there will be widespread loss of life too.<p>2. You think 9&#x2F;11 prompted too big a swing in the wrong direction on the &quot;safety vs. civil liberties&quot; scale? That will seem quaint and mild in comparison once an attack knocks a large region off the grid for months, or causes a chemical plant to release a large toxic cloud, or takes down air traffic control, and so on.