Breaking cybersecurity news, news analysis, commentary, and other content from around the world, with an initial focus on the Middle East & Africa and the Asia Pacific Taiwan Incident Highlights Cybersecurity Gaps in Rail Systems A Taiwanese student experimenting with software-defined radio technology shut down three bullet trains for nearly an hour, leading to an anti-terrorism response. The communications and monitoring platforms for rail networks has come under scrutiny following the recent "hacking" of a Taiwanese railway operators' radio system, which led to the emergency stoppage of three high-speed bullet trains for nearly an hour. On April 5, a 23-year-old train enthusiast used a software-defined radio set up and hardware bought online to spoof a general alarm, or GA, alert to the operations center of Taiwan High Speed Rail (THSR). The company issued orders for emergency braking to the three high-speed trains in the vicinity of the signal, resulting in a 48-minute delay in service. While few details have been reported, the compromise may have been simple — a voice or text that announced an emergency situation, says Wouter Bokslag, a founding partner of Dutch cybersecurity consultancy Midnight Blue, which has studied vulnerabilities in emergency radio systems. THSR reportedly used the emergency radio protocol known as Terrestrial Trunked Radio (TETRA), which can be secure, if set up correctly and maintained assiduously, but is also easy to leave in an insecure configuration, he says. "These technologies — the core of it definitely is old stuff, but it's reliable," he says. "The TETRA Network, under certain conditions, can definitely be secure and could be a suitable solution here, but I suspect they were not running the strongest of configurations for their network." Rail systems have increasingly come under scrutiny by cybersecurity researchers and cyberattackers. For two days in August 2023, hackers in