Politico | Major US fuel pipeline forced to shut down after being targeted in cyberattack
- The Colonial Pipeline ships petrol and jet fuel from the Gulf coast of Texas to the populous East Coast
- Joe Biden received a briefing on the incident on Saturday morning, a White House spokesperson said
This story is published in a content partnership with POLITICO. It was originally reported by Gloria Gonzales, Ben Lefebvre and Eric Geller on politico.com on May 8, 2021.
The attack on the Colonial Pipeline, which runs 5,500 miles and provides nearly half the petrol, diesel and jet fuel used on the East Coast, most immediately affected some of the company’s business-side computer systems – not the systems that directly run the pipelines themselves. The Georgia-based company said it shut down the pipelines as a precaution and has engaged a third-party cybersecurity firm to investigate the incident, which it confirmed was a ransomware attack. It first disclosed the shutdown late Friday and said it has also contacted law enforcement and other federal agencies.
Biden received a briefing on the incident Saturday morning, a White House spokesperson said, adding that the government “is working actively to assess the implications of this incident, avoid disruption to supply, and help the company restore pipeline operations as quickly as possible.”
A shutdown that lasts more than a few days could send petrol prices in the Southeastern US spiking above US$3 a gallon, market analysts said. That could deepen the political risks the incident poses for Biden, stealing momentum from his efforts to centre the nation‘s energy agenda on promoting cleaner sources and confronting climate change.
That means much depends on how quickly Colonial can restart the pipelines – which depends in large part on whether the company‘s cyber consultants can determine that it is safe to do so.