Wayne Greene
Tulsa World
Section: G6
4/12/2009

The computer screen goes black.

The lights flicker and go off.

You pick up the telephone, but the receiver is dead.

You try your cell phone. No luck.

You walk outside and your neighbors say the same thing is happening in their homes. You start the car and turn on the radio, but there is nothing there.

Traffic signals are lifeless.

Pumps at the gas station don't work.

Neither do ATM machines or credit card readers.

The slender electronic thread that civilized life depends on has snapped.

In a relatively short period of time — faster than the damage to the electronic grids can be repaired — food riots break out, and the government's ability to deal with the problem is hamstrung by the same lack of a basic communication and power system that is causing the problem in the first place.

That's the scenario pictured by University of Tulsa Professor Sujeet Shenoi, a world expert on the dangers of cyber crime and cyber espionage.

Cyber challenge

The Wall Street Journal reported last week that high-tech spies from China, Russia and elsewhere have penetrated the U.S. electrical grid with computer programs that could cripple our nation in times of conflict.

That's not news to Shenoi or his Cyber Corps, 40 computer whiz kids studying exactly how and where modern life is exposed.

The only surprise to him was that Department of Homeland Security officials were willing to talk about the problem to the newspaper.

"We've known that these things can be done for a long time," Shenoi said. "There are lots of people who know how to do it. The knowledge is there."

The biggest challenge isn't the technology of bringing down a complex system like the national electrical grid, but rather getting access to the exposed points, and that problem is getting easier, Shenoi said.

Consider the movie "Ocean's Eleven," in which a group of criminals infiltrates the security system of a big Las Vegas casino and manages to get away with a huge wad of money. The biggest challenge to George Clooney's caper was getting access to the security network inside the casino.

But the process of interconnectivity — the growing interdependence of things like the electrical grid, the telephone system and the Internet — is actually taking those exposure points outside the casino so to speak, Shenoi said.

The problem is that there are literally hundreds of exposed points in the system, and it's virtually impossible to harden all the targets, he said.

"How do you protect every one? You obviously can't."

Virtual defense

Ready for some good news?

If the Chinese and Russians have infiltrated our grid, chances are we've probably got theirs in the cross hairs too.

Shenoi is circumspect about the likelihood of the U.S. having bugs in the electronic systems of our potential enemies —"I think reasonable people would assume so" — but his point comes through.

Mutually assured destruction kept us from annihilating each other during the Cold War. Perhaps it will keep the power on and the telephone working.

Want some more good news?

Shenoi has attracted the top technological students in the nation to his Cyber Corps, the TU-based program that analyzes the weakness in our electronic security blanket and chases real bad guys through the virtual world.

The MacGyvers, as Shenoi is fond of calling his crew, are the best and the brightest computer science and engineering students — "Not No. 20 or 180, but 1,2, 3, 4." — working to defend the country's critical infrastructure assets.

"They're doing some wonderful things," Shenoi said.

But he also points this out: "A defender has to shut out the attacker. Not once or twice, but every time. This means that my MacGyvers have to be cleverer and much more dedicated than the attackers.

"We cannot afford to fail, or it would be a 9/11-type of situation. My students realize that suicide bombers do not call in sick."

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