One of the U.S. largest pipelines,Colonial Pipeline Company, which carries refined gasoline and jet fuel from Texas up the East Coast to New York, was forced to shut down after the Russian hacker attack, BBC reports.
On Saturday, as the F.B.I., the Energy Department and the White House delved into the details, Colonial Pipeline acknowledged that its corporate computer networks had been hit by a ransomware attack, in which criminal groups hold data hostage until the victim pays a ransom. The company said it had shut the pipeline itself, a precautionary act, apparently for fear that the hackers might have obtained information that would enable them to attack susceptible parts of the pipeline.
Russian criminal group called DarkSide is believed to be repsopnsible for a cyber attack. According to BBC, cyber-criminal gang has acknowledged the incident in a public statement.
"Our goal is to make money and not creating problems for society," DarkSide wrote on its website.
In a statement, the group described itself as “apolitical” and indicated it had not been aware that Colonial was being targeted by one of its affiliates, saying: "From today, we introduce moderation and check each company that our partners want to encrypt to avoid social consequences in the future."
"We do not participate in geopolitics, do not need to tie us with a defined government and look for... our motives," the group said.
On Monday, the FBI officially confirmed that DarkSide was responsible for compromising Colonial Pipeline's networks, saying that it was continuing to work with the firm and other government agencies on the investigation.During a speech about the economy at the White House on Monday, US President Joe Biden said that he was being "personally briefed" on the situation with the pipeline each day.
President Biden said that the US government was concerned about this aspect of the cyber-attack.
"I'm gonna be meeting with President Putin and so far there is no evidence, based on our intelligence people, that Russia is involved," he said, adding, "Although, there's evidence that the actors' ransomware is in Russia - they have some responsibility to deal with this."