--- title: Iran-linked hackers shut down a UK power plant for four days description: Iran-linked hackers shut down a small UK power plant, a peaker station, for four days in July, in what is described as the first successful attack of its kind... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/iran-linked-hackers-shut-down-a-uk-power-plant-for-four-days-qnidoep3f twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: Iran-linked hackers shut down a UK power plant for four days | daily.dev og:description: Iran-linked hackers shut down a small UK power plant, a peaker station, for four days in July, in what is described as the first successful attack of its kind... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/iran-linked-hackers-shut-down-a-uk-power-plant-for-four-days-qnidoep3f og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/QNIdoeP3f.png og:image:alt: Iran-linked hackers shut down a UK power plant for four days og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Iran-linked hackers shut down a UK power plant for four days **[The Next Web](https://daily.dev/sources/tnw)** · 6 min read · 1 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary Iran-linked hackers shut down a small UK power plant, a peaker station, for four days in July, in what is described as the first successful attack of its kind on British energy infrastructure. The UK government has not formally attributed the attack, and officials say there was no risk to the wider grid since the site was well below the threshold for mandatory cyber incident reporting. The outage coincided with a wave of attacks on US water utilities across a dozen states, which US agencies including CISA and the FBI have blamed on Iran, exploiting internet-connected Siemens S7 programmable logic controllers using AI-generated exploitation scripts. UK officials, including NCSC head Richard Horne, warn that attacks on critical infrastructure could rise sharply amid the ongoing Iran conflict, with the agency already handling over 200 attacks on critical national infrastructure in the past year. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Questions this post answers ### What caused the recent cyberattacks on US water treatment plants across multiple states? Attackers compromised internet-connected programmable logic controllers, including Siemens S7 controllers, at wastewater treatment plants using AI-generated exploitation scripts. The intrusions caused flooding and loss of water pressure across a dozen states, starting in Minnesota on July 26 and spreading to Michigan, Georgia, South Dakota, New Jersey and beyond. CISA, the FBI and the EPA attributed the activity to Iran. _Teams securing exposed ICS and PLC deployments can track emerging OT threats like this on daily.dev._ ### Did Iran-linked hackers actually shut down power in the UK? Yes, a small UK power plant, a peaker station used for short-term power generation, was taken offline for four days in July after a cyberattack attributed by reporting to Iran-linked hackers, though the UK government has not formally attributed the incident to any actor. Officials say the site was far below the size threshold requiring mandatory cyber incident reporting and posed no risk to the wider grid. _Engineers evaluating critical infrastructure risk can follow developments like this UK plant incident on daily.dev._ ### How are attackers using AI to exploit industrial control systems like Siemens S7 PLCs? Federal agencies warned that attackers are using AI-generated exploitation scripts to break into internet-exposed Siemens S7 controllers at water, manufacturing and energy sites, calling it an active rather than theoretical threat. This activity is believed to be part of the same Iran-affiliated campaign targeting programmable logic controllers seen in the US water utility attacks. _Security practitioners tracking AI-assisted exploitation of OT systems can follow this trend on daily.dev._ ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [Iran-linked cyberattack shut down a UK power plant](https://daily.dev/posts/iran-linked-cyberattack-shut-down-a-uk-power-plant-zukou3pe7) · The Register · 0 upvotes · 0 comments --- [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/iran-linked-hackers-shut-down-a-uk-power-plant-for-four-days-qnidoep3f) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"Iran-linked hackers shut down a UK power plant for four days","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/iran-linked-hackers-shut-down-a-uk-power-plant-for-four-days-qnidoep3f","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/iran-linked-hackers-shut-down-a-uk-power-plant-for-four-days-qnidoep3f"},"datePublished":"2026-08-24T19:51:56.085Z","dateModified":"2026-08-25T21:24:32.042Z","description":"Iran-linked hackers shut down a small UK power plant, a peaker station, for four days in July, in what is described as the first successful attack of its kind...","image":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto/v1/posts/b9ff2028b2844b53f43673e67217df90?_a=AQAEuop","thumbnailUrl":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto/v1/posts/b9ff2028b2844b53f43673e67217df90?_a=AQAEuop","isAccessibleForFree":true,"articleSection":"The Next Web","inLanguage":"en","publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180}},"author":{"@type":"Organization","name":"The Next Web","logo":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/t_logo,f_auto/v1/logos/tnw","url":"https://daily.dev/sources/tnw"},"commentCount":0,"discussionUrl":"https://daily.dev/posts/iran-linked-hackers-shut-down-a-uk-power-plant-for-four-days-qnidoep3f","interactionStatistic":[{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"LikeAction"},"userInteractionCount":1},{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"CommentAction"},"userInteractionCount":0}],"keywords":"","timeRequired":"PT6M"} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https://daily.dev"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"The Next Web","item":"https://daily.dev/sources/tnw"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"name":"Iran-linked hackers shut down a UK power plant for four days"}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"FAQPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/iran-linked-hackers-shut-down-a-uk-power-plant-for-four-days-qnidoep3f#faq","mainEntity":[{"@type":"Question","name":"What caused the recent cyberattacks on US water treatment plants across multiple states?","acceptedAnswer":{"@type":"Answer","text":"Attackers compromised internet-connected programmable logic controllers, including Siemens S7 controllers, at wastewater treatment plants using AI-generated exploitation scripts. The intrusions caused flooding and loss of water pressure across a dozen states, starting in Minnesota on July 26 and spreading to Michigan, Georgia, South Dakota, New Jersey and beyond. CISA, the FBI and the EPA attributed the activity to Iran. Teams securing exposed ICS and PLC deployments can track emerging OT threats like this on daily.dev."}},{"@type":"Question","name":"Did Iran-linked hackers actually shut down power in the UK?","acceptedAnswer":{"@type":"Answer","text":"Yes, a small UK power plant, a peaker station used for short-term power generation, was taken offline for four days in July after a cyberattack attributed by reporting to Iran-linked hackers, though the UK government has not formally attributed the incident to any actor. Officials say the site was far below the size threshold requiring mandatory cyber incident reporting and posed no risk to the wider grid. 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