A report was out today that shed light on the Advances in switching technologies which have exposed rail networks to the simplest form of cyber attacks that could be launched by inexperienced teen hackers.
The report said that Knowing how to trigger a denial of service attack could halt train services. Experts say the real problem is that rail switching networks use mobile phone signals to link railway switching systems together.
Denial of service campaigns are one of the simplest forms of cyber attack,where hackers recruit large numbers of computers to overwhelm the targeted system with Internet traffic.
Before tou panic, such attacks wont crash trains but will cause disruptions in the service.
Also the attacks require far less skill than penetrating a computer network or writing malicious software. Hackers have used the approach to attack government and business sites worldwide.
Train switching systems, which guide trains from one track to another marshalling yards, have historically been separate from the online world, but communication between trains and switches is handled increasingly using wireless technology.
—