FAA looks at cyber threats after incident at Warsaw Chopin Airport

June 29, 2015

The FAA is concerned about cybersecurity and airline industry vulnerability to hackers, mirroring concerns about medical device susceptibility to hacking and random EMI interference, as I reported earlier.

The FAA concerns follow a reported cyberattack on flight-planning computers at Warsaw Chopin Airport, according to Andy Pasztor in the Wall Street Journal. Officials said safety was not affected, but several flights were cancelled or delayed for several hours.

The FAA is hoping to identify the most important risk areas. Pasztor quotes Jens Hennig, cochairman of the FAA panel investigating cybersecurity, as saying, “The industry needs a set of graduated requirements.”

In addition, Pasztor reports, Boeing is paying red hat testers to try to hack onboard software, although Mike Sinnett, VP for product development for commercial aircraft at Boeing, tells Pasztor that flight-critical software is not susceptible to external hacking.

FAA administrator Michael Huerta is looking to facilitate the sharing of details of threats, potential incidents, and mitigations worldwide. Pasztor quotes him as saying, “One of the things that is absolutely critical is to have very robust mechanisms for information sharing.”

About the Author

Rick Nelson | Contributing Editor

Rick is currently Contributing Technical Editor. He was Executive Editor for EE in 2011-2018. Previously he served on several publications, including EDN and Vision Systems Design, and has received awards for signed editorials from the American Society of Business Publication Editors. He began as a design engineer at General Electric and Litton Industries and earned a BSEE degree from Penn State.

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