Tag Archive for: san

Friday, July 16, 2021, San Diego Metro Magazine

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The Global Chip Shortage Impact on American Automakers

Visual Capitalist

Chips, or semiconductor devices, are behind all of the world’s increasingly complex electrical and digital devices. 

That includes well-known items like computers and smartphones, but also other products that are becoming “smarter” including appliances, watches, and especially cars. 

The automotive industry accounts for a large share of global chip consumption, with modern cars having smart and complex entertainment systems, navigation, and sensors. A modern car can have anywhere from 500-1,500 different chips powering its different functions.

But when the COVID-19 pandemic hit in 2020, shifting consumer demands and a slowing economy called for a reduction in semiconductor manufacturing. And unfortunately, it can take the supply chain a long time to come back online, as much as 1.5 years. 

American Manufacturers Take the Biggest Hit

As the global economy has started to bounce back and demand for digital devices has increased, the chip manufacturing supply chain has become strained on its still-low supply. And unfortunately for automakers, cars are taking the brunt of the hit.

Photo by Obi Onyeador on Unsplash

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Sports tech company BlazePod opens first U.S.
office in Vista to support company growth, strategy

BlazePod, the creator of the Flash Reflex (FRX) training program that combines cognitive intelligence with physical exercises to enable athletes of all levels to improve reaction time and performance, is opening an office in Vista.

BlazePod’s office is located at 1281 Liberty Way, Suite A, Vista. The U.S. BlazePod team is led by Brian Farber, head of business development, and Tom Judge, Head of U.S. marketing. The company is looking to hire additional employees in the San Diego area this year.

Founded in 2017, BlazePod has raised a total of $10 million in funding over two rounds, and has experienced exponential year-over-year growth. The San Diego-based team will focus on driving marketing initiatives and sales education, and will also oversee the company’s U.S. operations and strategy.

Rady Children’s…

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Hacker allegedly tried to poison San Francisco Bay Area water supply

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A hacker allegedly tried to poison water being processed at a San Francisco Bay Area water treatment plant, according to an NBC News report late last week.

The attack took place on Jan. 15 and involved the person gaining access to the water treatment plant network by using a former employee’s TeamViewer account credentials. Having gained access to the plant, the person then deleted programs that the water plant uses to treat drinking water.

According to a confidential report compiled by the Northern California Regional Intelligence Center and seen by NBC, the hack was not discovered until the following day. The facility subsequently changed its passwords and reinstalled the programs. “No failures were reported as a result of this incident and no individuals in the city reported illness from water-related failures,” the report noted.

Michael Sena, the executive director of NCRIC, denied the report. “No one tried to poison any of our water. That is not accurate,” Sena told the San Franciso Chronicle, noting that tampering with computer programs would be unlikely to result in poisoning.

“It takes a lot to influence a water supply chain,” Sena explained. “For a large impact, there has to be a large change in the chemicals in the system. The amount of chemicals it would take to cause harm to people…. The numbers are astronomical.”

The Bay Area’s water supply threat is not the first compromise of a treatment plant and will likely not be the last. In February, an unknown attacker accessed a water treatment plant in Oldsmar, Florida, and attempted to poison the water supply by increasing the flow of sodium hydroxide to toxic levels. In that case, the attacker was detected before the water supply could be affected.

“While it’s important to keep an eye on major events, we should also avoid oversensationalized headlines intended to spread fear,” Chris Grove, technology evangelist at critical infrastructure security specialist Nozomi Networks Inc., told SiliconANGLE. “Some headlines are taking the action of deleting code and jumping to attempted mass poisoning. There was not an attempt at poisoning the water supply.”

That said, he added, “this…

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US Says Agencies Largely Fended Off Latest Russian Hack – NBC 7 San Diego

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The White House says it believes U.S. government agencies largely fended off the latest cyberespionage onslaught blamed on Russian intelligence operatives, saying the spear-phishing campaign should not further damage relations with Moscow ahead of next month’s planned presidential summit.

Officials downplayed the cyber assault as “basic phishing” in which hackers used malware-laden emails to target the computer systems of U.S. and foreign government agencies, think tanks and humanitarian groups. Microsoft, which disclosed the effort late Thursday, said it believed most of the emails were blocked by automated systems that marked them as spam.

As of Friday afternoon, the company said it was “not seeing evidence of any significant number of compromised organizations at this time.”

Even so, the revelation of a new spy campaign so close to the June 16 summit between President Joe Biden and Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin adds to the urgency of White House efforts to confront the Kremlin over aggressive cyber activity that criminal indictments and diplomatic sanctions have done little to deter.

“I don’t think it’ll create a new point of tension because the point of tension is already so big,” said James Lewis, a senior vice president at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “This clearly has to be on the summit agenda. The president has to lay down some markers” to make clear “that the days when you people could do whatever you want are over.”

The summit comes amid simmering tensions driven in part by election interference by Moscow and by a massive breach of U.S. government agencies and private corporations by Russian elite cyber spies who infected the software supply chain with malicious code. The U.S. responded with sanctions last month, prompting the Kremlin to warn of retribution.

Asked Friday whether the latest hacking effort would affect the Biden-Putin summit, principal deputy press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said, “We’re going to move forward with that.”

The U.S., which has previously called out Russia or criminal groups based there for hacking operations, did not blame anyone for the latest incident. Microsoft…

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What We Know About San Diego Scripps Health Cyberattack – NBC 7 San Diego

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What to Know

  • The California Department of Public health calls the cyberattack “ransomware attacks”
  • Scripps did not provide any information on how the cyberattack occurred but later determined that the outage was due to a security incident involving malware on its computer networks
  • The cyberattack caused rescheduled appointments, affected Scripps email servers, and suspended access to patient portals and other tech applications

One of San Diego’s main health care systems, Scripps Health, had its technology servers hacked on May 1 in what has been deemed a ransomware attack by the California Department of Public Health (CDPH).

And, although the incident has disrupted access to patient information, affected the ability of health care workers to do their jobs and led to a lack of communication with patients, Scripps Health has provided little details about the cyberattack.


NBC 7

Patients who have appointments scheduled in the coming days can call 1-800-SCRIPPS for more information about their appointment status.

The local health-care provider, operates five hospitals in San Diego, along with a series of clinics.

Here’s what happened in the last week, what we know and what we don’t know:

May 2, 2021

Scripps Health first confirmed on Sunday that their technology servers were hacked overnight forcing the health care system to switch to offline chart systems and causing a disruption to their patient portals.

Scripps did not provide any information on how the cyberattack occurred or state exactly what systems were affected by the breach.

The health care system said they suspended access to their patient portals and other “technology applications related to our operations at our health care facilities,” but stressed that patient care continues using “established back-up processes, including offline documentation methods.”

The San Diego County Office of Emergency Services (OES) said ambulances were being diverted from Scripps’ facilities to other hospitals in the area but that it was a precautionary measure.

As of May 5, the county had stopped adjusting its routing of…

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