Mumbai's power outage a possible cyberattack: Report

A probe into the rare power outage in Mumbai last month has revealed that it was a cyberattack involving foreign entities.

A month-long probe detected the presence of multiple “suspicious log-ins” into the servers connected with the power supply and transmission by accounts operating from Singapore and other south Asian countries, according to a report by Mumbai Mirror.

In a rare power outage on October 12, trains had come to a halt mid-track, employees working from home got impacted and people suffered inconveniences like getting stuck in elevators. Although power was completely restored only after midnight in some areas, supply continued to be erratic on the next day as well in some pockets.

Also Read | Sabotage suspected in Mumbai power outage: Maharashtra Energy Minister Nitin Raut

A source told the news website that hackers have been trying to target the country’s power utilities since February. The hackers had tried to cripple websites connected to utility providers and organisations involved in banking and information management services.

Taking control of the situation, Maharashtra Energy Minister Nitin Raut had asked a state-run power generation company to add a gas-based capacity of up to 2,000 MW in the vicinity of the city. He also said that a "possibility of sabotage could not be ruled out in in this issue".

It can be noted that the state-run transmission utility had stated that a delay in Tata Power starting to generate power from its units as one of the reasons for the collapse of the power grids.