Cyberattack briefly shuts down Braham water plant, targets at least 4 other Minnesota communities
An investigation is underway to determine who is behind a cyberattack that briefly shut down a water plant in Braham, Minnesota, on Monday morning and hit at least four other communities across the state, officials in the east-central city said.
The City of Braham said in a Facebook post at 9:34 a.m. Monday that its water plant was offline for an unknown reason. Just under two hours later, officials said the facility was back online and that the cause of the outage was a “malicious cyber-attack of computerized operating systems by unknown actors.”
Braham officials said the attack shut down the “operating controls,” which resulted in the shutdown of the well and water treatment plant. They added that it did not cause any physical issues to the facility, nor did it impact water quality or safety.
“The City of Braham’s Public works crews were able to quickly determine the issue and mediate the cause of the outage,” city officials said in a news release.
Braham’s city administrator is requesting that the city’s “system vulnerability study” be evaluated to identify and mitigate any vulnerabilities or potential vulnerabilities exposed by the attack.
The release also said the city was informed that at least four other communities were attacked “with the same result.”
The document didn’t name the locations, though officials in South St. Paul, Minnesota, said Monday afternoon that they identified a cybersecurity incident involving technology used for parts of the city’s water utility system.
South St. Paul officials said that while the incident impacted some automated controls, steps that were taken allowed Public Works staff to maintain normal water and wastewater operations.
The Twin Cities suburb of Plymouth may also have been targeted, according to city officials. In a Facebook post, they said an issue impacting communications at two of the city’s water towers and multiple lift stations that began late Sunday is believed to have been caused by a cyberattack.
“Water levels and water quality are unaffected – the water is safe and there is no need for the public to adjust consumption,” Plymouth officials said in the post. “The issue is limited to equipment connected via cellular communications within the system, and crews have continued operating as normal through manual procedures.”
Officials in Maple Plain, located on the west side of Hennepin County, said they identified a cybersecurity incident involving the city’s water utility technology early on Monday. The incident affected “certain automated control functions,” but city workers have been able to maintain normal operations.
The Maple Plain City Council held an emergency meeting on Monday afternoon to review response efforts and talk about measures to protect “critical infrastructure and public services,” according to the city.
Minnesota IT Services says it’s providing cybersecurity and technical support to local workers responding to the attack.
“Our teams are helping assess potential cyber impacts, share threat information, and support response and remediation efforts. We are working closely with our partners to protect critical systems while the investigation continues,” the state agency said in a written statement.
