Analyst's note:   Now I feel so much better ... it was only a American contractor on personal business in Russia who exercised his remote access capability to the public water system and thus the water pump in Springfield, IL .... over Russian circuits.  No problem here.  Just move along please.  stuxnet, troubling

"A water-pump failure in Illinois that appeared to be the first foreign cyberattack on a public utility in the United States was in fact caused by a plant contractor traveling in Russia, according to a source familiar with a federal investigation of the incident.

Investigators analyzed log files and connections to foreign Internet protocol addresses within the utility’s computer system, said the source, who was not authorized to speak for attribution. “No indictors of malicious activity were found” in the computer system of the Curran-Gardner Townships Public Water District in Springfield, the source said.

The contractor, who had remote access to the computer system, was in Russia on personal business, the source added.

[....] DHS was alerted to the Illinois report on Nov. 16 and at the water district’s request, on Sunday sent a team of industrial control system experts to the water plant to investigate, according to a DHS bulletin. FBI officials also took part in the inquiry, which included interviewing personnel and collecting logs for analysis. The agencies concluded that there was no malicious or unauthorized traffic from Russia, as stated in the preliminary Illinois report.

Plant and federal officials are still investigating the cause of the pump’s failure."

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