Information and cyber-physical systems

Malicious software spreading across systems, whether self-propagating or delivered, that destroys, steals or locks data and disrupts operations.

Also: computer worm, wiper

Malware that encrypts or steals data and demands payment, halting hospitals, utilities, local governments and firms.

Unauthorised access to, or release of, personal, commercial or operational data.

Also: data leak

A long-dwell, well-resourced intrusion that quietly gains and keeps access to a network to spy, steal or prepare disruption.

Also: advanced persistent threat, long-dwell intrusion

Overloading a service or network with traffic or requests so that legitimate users cannot reach it.

Also: DDoS

Tampering with a product, update or provider so that many downstream customers receive a compromised component.

Also: poisoned update, compromised vendor

Deception such as phishing, impersonation or pretexting that tricks people into handing over access, money or data.

Also: phishing, fraud call, impersonation

Coordinated or sustained online abuse, including bullying, that harms mental health and can drive self-harm.

Also: cyberbullying

Linking released or anonymised datasets, often with AI, to reveal identities, locations or sensitive traits of people and communities who were meant to be protected.

Also: de-anonymisation, linkage attack, mosaic effect

Coordinated spread of false or manipulated information to mislead the public, disrupt crisis response or erode trust.

Also: coordinated false information, information operation

Tampering with data, sensors or models so that decisions based on them are wrong.

Also: data poisoning, sensor spoofing

Intrusion into or disruption of voter registers, counting, results reporting or election officials' systems that undermines a vote or public trust in it.

Also: voter roll tampering, election systems hack

Covert alteration of authoritative records, such as land, health, financial or legal registers, that destroys trust and causes wrongful decisions.

Also: registry tampering, land record fraud

Rapid spread of false or misleading information without coordinated intent, often amplified by platforms and AI, that drowns out accurate warnings during crises.

Also: infodemic, rumour cascade, information disorder

Publication or leak of knowledge that gives others the means to cause serious harm, such as weapon methods, exploit details or sensitive infrastructure and species locations.

Also: information hazard, infohazard

Unauthorised control of the computers that run machinery, plants and utilities, able to cause physical damage or stoppage.

Also: SCADA attack

A cyberattack that trips or disables generation, substations or grid control and so causes outages.

A cyberattack on signalling, traffic, port, aviation or vessel systems that causes delays, closures or collisions.

Also: signalling attack, port system attack

A cyberattack on hospitals and care networks that forces patient diversion, cancels care and can endanger lives.

Also: hospital ransomware

Attack on or failure of connected medical devices, such as pumps, implants and imaging systems, that endangers patients or stops treatment.

Also: implant hacking, infusion pump attack

Intrusion into the control systems of water or wastewater plants that alters treatment, stops pumping or causes overflows.

Also: water treatment hacking

Compromise of controls for heating, cooling, lifts, doors and fire systems that disrupts or endangers occupied buildings and data centres.

Also: building management hacking, smart building attack

Coordinated takeover of many internet-connected inverters, chargers or appliances to swing demand or generation and destabilise a grid.

Also: inverter fleet hijack, smart charger manipulation, load-altering attack

Cyberattack that targets the protective safety controllers of a hazardous plant, removing the last barrier against explosion or release.

Also: safety controller attack

Cyber intrusion into satellites, their ground control or user terminals that disables service or hijacks spacecraft.

Also: satellite hijack, modem wiper on satellite network

Remote compromise of connected or automated vehicles through shared software or back-end services, risking crashes or fleet-wide immobilisation.

Also: remote vehicle hacking

Loss or corruption of satellite positioning and timing, from jamming, spoofing or space weather, that disorients vehicles, vessels and aircraft and unsynchronises networks.

Also: GPS jamming, GPS spoofing

Failure of a large shared cloud, software or platform provider that takes down many dependent services at once.

Also: cloud failure

Large-scale failure of internet routing, naming or exchange points that cuts access to many services.

Also: DNS outage, routing leak

Damage to seabed communication or power cables, from anchors, trawling, quakes, slides or sabotage, that isolates regions.

Also: cable sabotage, cable break

Failure of payment, banking or settlement systems that stops transactions and access to cash.

Also: banking outage

Harmful interference or jamming of radio frequencies used by aviation, maritime, satellite, cellular and emergency links, degrading or cutting communications and sensing.

Also: radio jamming, satellite uplink jamming

Outage, breach or exclusionary design of national digital identity, payment, registry or benefit platforms, cutting people off from services, aid and money when it matters most.

Also: digital identity outage, DPI failure, e-government outage

Takeover of a central identity or sign-on service that lets attackers enter every connected system as trusted users.

Also: single sign-on breach, directory takeover

Theft or misuse of keys that sign software, certificates or tokens, letting attackers pass malicious code or fake sites as genuine.

Also: code-signing key theft, certificate authority breach

Service failure when a certificate, key or credential that many systems depend on expires or is revoked unexpectedly.

Also: expired certificate outage

Discovery that an encryption or signature scheme, or its implementation, can be broken, exposing protected data and trust across many systems.

Also: broken encryption, weak random number generator, Sudden break of a deployed cryptographic scheme, cryptanalytic breakthrough, broken cipher

Large-scale automated use of stolen or guessed credentials to take over accounts, draining funds, spreading fraud and opening deeper intrusions.

Also: credential stuffing, password spraying, Identity and credential compromise, account takeover, credential theft, identity theft

Outage or compromise of a national digital identity or civil register that blocks access to benefits, health, banking and voting, or exposes everyone enrolled.

Also: electronic identity outage, identity register breach

A flawed but non-malicious software update pushed automatically to many machines at once, crashing systems across airlines, hospitals, banks and emergency services.

Also: bad patch outage, faulty security update

Rapid exploitation of a newly found flaw in widely used software or network devices, compromising thousands of organisations before patches land.

Also: zero-day mass exploitation, edge device exploitation wave, Systemic cyber event, cyber contagion, cyber catastrophe, global cyber collapse

Large networks of hijacked cameras, routers and household devices used for floods of traffic, fraud or as cover for intrusions.

Also: IoT botnet, router botnet

Compromise of an outsourced IT or security provider whose remote access reaches many client organisations at once.

Also: IT provider breach, remote management tool abuse

Hidden malicious functions in chips, boards or firmware, introduced in design, manufacture or supply, that survive reinstallation and allow covert control.

Also: firmware implant, hardware trojan, malicious chip

Harm done by staff, contractors or partners who misuse legitimate access to steal data, sabotage systems or help outside attackers.

Also: malicious insider, privileged user misuse, insider sabotage

Theft of large sums by compromising payment messaging, bank systems or digital asset platforms, often to fund states or crime.

Also: payment messaging fraud, digital asset exchange hack

Permanent loss of records, such as health, land or archive data, when primary and backup copies are destroyed, encrypted or corrupted together.

Also: backup failure, data destruction

Software failure when date or time counters overflow, roll over or meet an unexpected leap second, crashing or corrupting many systems at once.

Also: time counter overflow, leap-second bug