A Texas family is suing the City of Dallas for over $100 million after a 66-year-old woman reportedly fell into a manhole and was found dead three days later in a sewage treatment plant nine miles away.
The lawsuit raises questions about safety measures and accountability following the tragic incident.
EPA Report Highlights Water Affordability Challenges
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency recently released a report to Congress detailing water affordability across the U.S. among households and utilities.
The report, titled “Water Affordability Needs Assessment,” summarizes decades of research by utilities, academics and associations. It includes recommendations, such as potentially establishing a federal water assistance program; increasing education, outreach and knowledge around solutions to address affordability; and increasing ways to reduce water infrastructure capital and operating costs.
The EPA estimates that between 12.1 million and 19.2 million households throughout the U.S. lack access to affordable water services. Nationally, the cost of unaffordable water service bills ranges from $5.1 billion to $8.8 billion.
CISA and EPA Collaborate on Cybersecurity Recommendations Fact Sheet
A recently released joint fact sheet — created in collaboration between the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency and the EPA — supplies water and wastewater facilities with recommendations for limiting the exposure of Human Machine Interfaces (HMIs) and securing them against malicious cyber activity.
In the absence of cybersecurity controls, threat actors can exploit exposed HMIs at water and wastewater utilities to view the contents of the HMI, make unauthorized changes and potentially disrupt the facility’s water and/or wastewater treatment process. CISA strongly encourages that utilities review and implement the mitigations in this fact sheet to harden remote access to HMIs.
