Expanded US water system cyber services mulled by DEF CON initiative

After initially providing free cybersecurity services to five water utilities in Indiana, Oregon, Utah, and Vermont, organizers of the DEF CON Franklin project are mulling to supercharge the initiative's growth by the end of the year in a bid to bolster water cybersecurity across the U.S. amid escalating cybersecurity threats that coincided with reduced federal support for the Multi-State Information Sharing and Analysis Center and the Environmental Protection Agency, The Register reports.

Massively scaling the DEF CON Franklin project within a short amount of time has been made possible by free access to Dragos' operational technology cybersecurity tools, as well as support from Craig Newark Philanthropies, according to DEF CON Franklin co-founder and University of Chicago Cyber Policy Initiative Executive Director Jake Braun. "Our volunteers are now working with companies like Dragos to figure out what tools are most applicable to water, which ones are free and are not freemium, because we don't want to stick these utilities with some tech that all of a sudden they need to pay for six months from now," said Braun.