CNN Intelligence Analysts Warns of ‘Cyber Hacking Perfect Storm’: Russia Has Spent Years Infiltrating Critical Infrastructure

CNN’s Victor Blackwell spoke with chief law enforcement and intelligence analyst John Miller on Tuesday about the recent cyber attacks that took down airport websites across the country Monday.

“A dozen U.S. airport websites, including LAX and Atlanta’s Hartsfield Jackson, are back online after an apparent cyber attack by pro-Russian hackers,” Blackwell began, adding:

There were no immediate signs of impact to air travel operations, but the hack did affect sites where travelers check flight information, parking, other airport details. And the hacking group known as Killnet is claiming responsibility. Joining us now is John Miller, CNN chief law enforcement and intelligence analyst. John, this group, Killnet. What do we know about them?

“Well, this is a pro-Russian hacking group, not a part of the government, at least not yet. It’s a group of hackers that have attacked on behalf of Russia a number of other countries. What’s interesting is we hadn’t really seen them in the United States until just a few weeks ago in August,” Miller replied.

“They attacked Lockheed Martin, claiming to try to get into control systems and get employees information. Lockheed Martin, of course, is the manufacturer of the HIMARS missile system that we’ve been given to the Ukrainians that they’ve been using with tremendous effect,” Miller continued, noting the Russian invasion of Ukraine is a factor behind these attacks.

“The weekend’s airport attack, not sophisticated, a DDoS attack, which is basically flooding all of the websites with hundreds of thousands of requests from IP addresses until you crash them. But it’s effective in that it was a nuisance. It knocked websites off, didn’t get into air traffic control, none of the safety systems,” Miller noted, explaining the attack could have been much worse.

“But they’re making their presence known and they do a little victory lap claiming credit on behalf of the Russian nationalist cause,” Miller concluded.

“How vulnerable are the U.S. critical infrastructure sites, especially because, as you said, this one was an annoyance. But could they do more? Could they be even more impactful?” Blackwell followed up.

“Victor. I think we’re entering the critical infrastructure, cyber hacking, perfect storm. You know, you have Russian groups. These are the pros from Dover, Center 16. These are elements of the FSB and the SVR, the Russian intelligence services, who have spent years carefully infrastructure, carefully infiltrating and compromising U.S. critical infrastructure systems,” Miller warned in response, adding:

And that’s going to be out there. At the same time, the main cyber actors on the state side in terms of rogue nations are Russia, China, Iran and North Korea, all of whom are aligned against the United States and most of whom are aligned with Putin and Russia right now. So the potential onslaught of critical infrastructure attacks from malicious state actors is going to be pretty high and for a while.

Watch the full clip above via CNN.