Senate subcommittee to hold hearing on electric grid cybersecurity

The U.S. Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources announced this week that the Energy Subcommittee will hold a hearing discussing electric grid cybersecurity later this month.

The hearing will examine cybersecurity threats to the U.S. electric grid and using technology to minimize these threats. The Senate will also hear testimony on S. 79, the Securing Energy Infrastructure Act.

U.S. Sens. Angus King (I-ME) and Jim Risch (R-ID), both members of the Senate Intelligence Committee, reintroduced S. 79 in January. The legislation would replace connected operating systems, which are vulnerable to hacking, with analog and human-operated systems. A positive factor of the analog and human-operated systems is that they are less advanced and less susceptible to cyber attacks.

“More than a year has passed since we saw Ukraine plunged into darkness as a result of a cyber-attack that cut electricity to hundreds of thousands of people,” King said. “Meanwhile, here in the United States, we have been too slow to take meaningful action to protect ourselves from similar attacks. It’s vital that we act now to bolster the grid’s cyber defenses or we risk a potentially catastrophic attack. This bill has broad, bipartisan support, and I hope we can advance it quickly in the new Congress.”

Specifically, the bill would establish a two-year pilot program with the National Labs to identify security vulnerabilities and test technologies, including analog devices, that could help mitigate threats. It would also create a working group made up of members of federal government agencies, the energy industry, a state or regional energy agency, the National Laboratories, and other relevant groups to evaluate the National Lab’s proposed technology solutions.