Hackers' Breach of Australian Regional Water Supplier Went Undetected for Nine Months

NSO CEO quits job before his start date, Grief ransomware group exposed a wealth of sensitive financial and personal from NRA hack, U.S. joins 80-nation cybersecurity agreement, much more

Australia’s Queensland's largest regional water supplier, Sunwater, says hackers targeted it in a cyber security breach that went undetected for nine months.

Last year, the hackers left suspicious files on a webserver to redirect visitor traffic to an online video platform. The breach occurred between August 2020 and May 2021 and involved unauthorized access to the entity's web server that stored customer information. Weaknesses in an older, more vulnerable Sunwater system had allowed the cyber breach to remain undetected for nine months.

Sunland said no financial or customer data had been compromised, and it took immediate steps to improve security once it detected the unauthorized access. The Sunwater revelation followed a Queensland's Audit Office report into the state's water authorities that did not name Sunwater. That report called for immediate action to fix "ongoing security weaknesses in information systems.” (Rory Callinan / ABC News)