Russia/US: Hackers penetrated US aviation in attack on American infrastructure

Russian hackers penetrated the US civilian aviation system in early 2017 as part of a broad assault on the nation’s sensitive infrastructure, a consortium designed to protect the industry has said. “It hit a part of our very broad membership,” said Jeff Troy, executive director of the Aviation Information Sharing and Analysis Centre, on Friday. The intrusion wasn’t something that would directly harm air planes or airlines, he added, “but I did see that this impacted some companies that are in the aviation sector”. Troy would not elaborate on the nature of the breach and declined to identify specific companies or the affected sector, but said the industry has taken steps to prevent a repeat of the intrusion. His comments confirmed the impact on aviation from a Russian attack that was described more broadly on Thursday by US government officials. The Department of Homeland Security and Federal Bureau of Investigation identified aviation as one of the targets, but did not provide specifics.<br/>