It's been a busy week for hackers. Last week, the Norwegian government revealed that computers holding confidential information in the country's oil, gas and defense interests had been hacked. This week, it's being reported that hackers accessed the network controlling a fresh water facility in an unnamed Illinois city, and turned a pump on and off so many times and so frequently that it failed. Apparently, problems with the systems had been noticed for months, but it wasn't until recently that the pump finally failed and cyber-attacks were recognized as the source of the problem.

It's believed at this point that the software vendor who built elements of the network experienced a hack during which the water utility's usernames and passwords were stolen. The IP address of the hackers was traced to Russia, BBC news is reporting today.

The FBI and Department for Homeland Security are reportedly investigating both this incident and what may be evidence of a second, separate attack. It's unknown at this point if the hackers have attempted to hack other water or utility systems.

The attacks were first revealed on the blog of Joe Weiss, an adviser to utility companies on cyber-security. Weiss recommends a number of steps to be taken by utility companies to prevent these types of attacks, including better coordination and disclosure by the government, better information sharing with industry, advanced control system cybersecurity training and policies, and the implementation of control system forensics.

A spokesman for the Department of Homeland Security indicated that facts were being gathered about the incident. “At this time there is no credible corroborated data that indicates a risk to critical infrastructure entities or a threat to public safety,” said the spokesman.