Accidental disruption in NYC

By Dave Anderson:

Accidental systems disruption happened in New York earlier this week. Fox has the local story:

The Department of Environmental Protection says the spill occurred when a contractor drilled into a jet fuel system of the Buckeye Partners at Skillman Avenue and 37th Street.

Systems disruption would be remarkably easy as the target set could be deduced from looking at New York's no-dig or call before digging zones and it would be completely non-noticable if the system disrupter was driving a truck with a logo and a fake phone number on it. There is enough construction and maitenance activity that no one would bat an eye at another truck digging/drilling in Queens. Escape would be easy and no one would really remember anything too interesting. It is a replicable attack. This is a much simpler and more productive attack profile than most of the half baked high symbolism/low disruption plots that get busted every six months.

Comments

[ACLipscomb]

I'm surprised that terrorists haven't gone after our communications infrastructure yet. I used to work for a mid-sized telecommunications carrier, and I was shocked to find out how bad security is at the relay sites along fiber optic routes - and how many of those sites have all of the major telcomm companies colocated.

By hitting sites in just 3-4 cities, I figure you could take out at least half of the coast-to-coast communications network. Hit 6 sites and you could cripple our entire network.

[Ol'Froth]

I recall a group of pranksters active in NYC many years ago. They dressed up in construction attire, blocked off a section of street, and tore it up. No one paid any attention to them, because they looked like people doing something they were supposed to be doing.