Securing Water Utilities: Plugging OT Security Leaks

**Executive Summary:** The report details a series of active hacktivist operations—attributed to the Russia-aligned People's Cyber Army and affiliates—targeting internet-exposed HMIs and SCADAView instances in water and wastewater utilities across the US and Europe, exploiting VNC remote access and default credentials; it outlines observed incidents, the operational and public-health impacts, exposure trends (Shodan-sourced ScadaView counts), and prioritized mitigations such as VPN+MFA, network segmentation, asset visibility, and incident response planning.