Gas Shortage Again!

[LSUDad]

Looks like they are starting another shortage. Folks lining up at the pumps. 
A problem with a Colonial Pipeline. 
Years ago a tow of barges supplied much of the upriver terminals. One tow had 12 barges, 275,000 bbls. of products. That’s 11.5Million gallons. 
 

Tell me again, why do you want to get rid of pipelines? 
 

Like I always say, to create a shortage, tell folks there is a shortage. 
 

Im just buying toilet paper. 

[LSUDad]

 

 

[LSUDad]

I’d like to clear something up. If you live in Louisiana the Colonial outage WILL NOT EFFECT YOU!!!  Colonial delivers to the EAST COAST. Louisiana gets its fuel from our own refineries. But during this time, at least two things will happen, folks will continue to top off their tanks and gas cans, also, the price will go up. 

 

Enjoy the shortage! 

[Herb]

Up here idiots are panicking and filling up anything that can hold gasoline.

Luckily, I filled up my hybrid 4 days ago and am sitting on 600 miles estimated cruising distance on this tank of gas.

[LSUDad]

1 hour ago, Herb said:

Up here idiots are panicking and filling up anything that can hold gasoline.

Luckily, I filled up my hybrid 4 days ago and am sitting on 600 miles estimated cruising distance on this tank of gas.

Just drove from Fairhope, Al to Woodstock, Ga.

 

 The pipeline is back up and running. 

Edited May 13, 2021 by LSUDad

[Hatchertiger]

12 hours ago, LSUDad said:

The pipeline is back up and running. 

Thanks for checking on that for us

[Hatchertiger]

Being reported that the company paid $5M in ransom to hackers to get it up and running again.

[Nutriaitch]

13 hours ago, Herb said:

Luckily, I filled up my hybrid 4 days ago and am sitting on 600 miles estimated cruising distance on this tank of gas.

 

yeah, I'd love to have the fuel efficiency of a Hybrid, but unfortunately, they don't make Hybrids that do what I need a vehicle to do.

 

[LSUDad]

https://link.nationalreview.com/click/23832894.68007/aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cubmF0aW9uYWxyZXZpZXcuY29tL25ld3MvY29sb25pYWwtcGlwZWxpbmUtcGFpZC1oYWNrZXJzLTUtbWlsbGlvbi1yYW5zb20tcmVwb3J0Lz91dG1fc291cmNlPWVtYWlsJnV0bV9tZWRpdW09YnJlYWtpbmcmdXRtX2NhbXBhaWduPW5ld3N0cmFjayZ1dG1fdGVybT0yMzgzMjg5NA/5e7376314843ea35d25fb20eC76098748

[Herb]

Looks like the hacking group responsible has gotten extreme pressure from the US and is shutting down.

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/14/business/darkside-pipeline-hack.html

[dachsie]

On 5/12/2021 at 10:53 PM, LSUDad said:

Just drove from Fairhope, Al to Woodstock, Ga.

 

 The pipeline is back up and running. 

I was in Fairhope May 2-7

 

[LSUDad]

22 hours ago, dachsie said:

I was in Fairhope May 2-7

 

I was there also, wish I would have known.

[LSUDad]

On 5/15/2021 at 7:30 AM, Herb said:

Looks like the hacking group responsible has gotten extreme pressure from the US and is shutting down.

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/14/business/darkside-pipeline-hack.html

You think that is going to stop them? 
 

[houtiger]

4 hours ago, LSUDad said:

You think that is going to stop them? 
 

 

On 5/15/2021 at 6:30 AM, Herb said:

Looks like the hacking group responsible has gotten extreme pressure from the US and is shutting down.

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/14/business/darkside-pipeline-hack.html

Herb's article is the most interesting article since LSU won the Natty in Jan. 2020!  (I just don't want to forget that!)

 

Quote

 

May 14, 2021

The criminal hacking group DarkSide, which the F.B.I. has blamed for carrying out a ransomware attack that crippled fuel delivery across the Southeastern United States this week, has announced that it is shutting down because of unspecified “pressure” from the United States.

In a statement written in Russian and provided to The New York Times on Friday by the cybersecurity firm Intel 471, DarkSide said it had lost access to the public-facing portion of its online system, including its blog and payment server, as well as funds that it said had been withdrawn to an unknown account. It said the group’s main web page and other public-facing resources would go offline within 48 hours.

“Due to the pressure from the U.S., the affiliate program is closed,” the statement said, referring to intermediary hackers, the so-called affiliates, it works with to break into corporate computer systems. “Stay safe and good luck.”

What that pressure may have been is unclear, but on Thursday, President Biden said the United States would not rule out a retaliatory strike against DarkSide that would “disrupt their ability to operate.” The White House spokeswoman, Jen Psaki, said the administration was waiting for recommendations from U.S. Cyber Command, but government officials on Friday declined to comment further about whether any action had been taken.

Continue reading the main stor

Cybersecurity analysts cautioned that the DarkSide statement could be a ruse, allowing its members to regroup and deflect the negative attention caused by the attack.

The crisis began when Colonial Pipeline, the operator of one of the nation’s largest fuel pipelines, announced on May 7 that it had been hit with a ransomware attack, in which criminal groups lock up computer systems and hold data hostage until the victim pays a ransom. In response, the company protectively shut down its pipeline, which delivers nearly half of the jet fuel and gasoline used on the Atlantic Coast, disrupting air travel and causing drivers to descend on gas stations in a surge of panic buying.

To free up its computer systems, Colonial Pipeline paid the extortionists about 75 Bitcoin, or nearly $5 million, according to people briefed on the transaction. The decision allowed the company to get gas flowing again, but may have complicated the Biden administration’s efforts to stave off new attacks.

Elliptic, a computer security company specializing in cryptocurrency, said on Friday that it had identified the Bitcoin wallet used by DarkSide to collect the Colonial Pipeline ransom payment. In a statement, Elliptic said Colonial Pipeline sent the ransom payment to DarkSide last Saturday.

Since the DarkSide account was opened in March, Elliptic said, it had received $17.5 million from 21 Bitcoin wallets, indicating the number of ransoms it had collected just this spring. Cybersecurity analysts assess that the group has been active since at least August, and has most likely used a number of different Bitcoin wallets to receive ransoms.

But on Thursday, someone withdrew roughly 113.5 Bitcoin, or $5.6 million, from DarkSide’s Bitcoin wallet and moved it into an unknown user’s account, according to TRM Labs, a San Francisco blockchain intelligence company. The sum amounted to Colonial’s 75 Bitcoin ransom plus that of a German company, Brenntag, which also opted to pay its digital extortionists, TRM Labs said.

To whom that other account belongs is yet another plot twist in the hacking episode.

“It’s hard to speculate,” Esteban Castaño, a co-founder of TRM Labs, said in an interview Friday. He noted that whoever moved DarkSide’s winnings would have had access to the group’s private key to its Bitcoin wallet.

“The question is where were those private keys stored?” Mr. Castaño said. “Were they on some server that someone else got ahold of? Or did DarkSide initiate the transfer themselves?”

The intense scrutiny that followed the Colonial Pipeline attack has clearly unsettled ransomware groups. This week, the operators behind two major Russian-language ransomware platforms, REvil and Avaddon, announced strict new rules governing the use of their products, including bans on targeting government-affiliated entities, hospitals or educational institutions.

 

Very interesting.  From what I read, the US has the best cyber warriors at the NSA, followed by Russia and China tied for second.  Nobody can see anything, so we are down to what we read.  Darkside could have moved their bitcoins in order to keep the US from stealing them back, or we might have stolen them back, and helped our German allies out in the process, a good step to garner some good will and reinforce that NATO is alive.

Here's the bottom line.  Russian actors have been doing this to US companies and govt. entities for several years, with increasing rapidity.  If we want it to stop, we have to hit them back.  Putin clearly is shielding whoever is doing it, either under direction of the russian govt. or at least with the permission of them.  In order to make it stop, we have to cause them more pain than the reward that they get, then it will stop.

We didn't cause much pain if we did steal their bitcoin (wiped them out of that account, but apparently they have several accounts).  Biden will speak to Putin, and tell him we took it easy on them this time, all it cost them was all of their revenue for the time it took to develop the code, and execute the attack on Colonial.  How would you like to work for nothing for a few months, donate your labor for nothing?  That hurt somebody, several somebodies.  I heard an estimate that to pull off the code development, design a specific hack for Colonial, collect the money and operate a public relations public facing website, you are probably talking 100 - 200 people.  Who knows, they may have an HR and accounting dept.!

It could have been an interesting play by the US, pay the ransom to get the pipeline back up ASAP, and we will take your money back.  Sounds to me like that was the plan Colonial and the US NSA came up with.

It appears to me, something the US would do to protect our companies.  Would it stop Darkside and the hackers who use their software?  I don't know, maybe they collect the ransom in bitcoin, and the minute it hits, move it, or move it to a russian bank that will cash it in for rubles.  But then, Biden is talking to Putin, if russia does that, we have other more painful responses and we will use them.  Do you really want to go to cyber warfare with the US?  It is not in either countries interest to escalate this situation, so just stop!

Like I say, very interesting to see what happens in the next few months.

[Eq4bits]

I remember 1970’s gas shortage…. In Atlanta then & if license plate ended in even # you could buy gas on certain days of week and if ended with an odd # other days if week.