San Francisco (CA) - It took hackers less than a day to take over several desktops at a major power company. Ira Winkler, a penetration testing consultant, and his team were able to trick company employees into clicking false links which contained self-installing Trojan horse software. Winkler says his team had complete control of the computers and could have caused even more damage to the company's power production and distribution systems.

The team targeted employees by scouring user groups for people interested in power control software SCADA. The team then tricked those employees into clicking a link by sending emails about a cut in benefits. Talk about sneaky.

Apparently the test was so successful that it was called off before the day was over. Hopefully Winlker's team is paid by the job and not by the hour!

Read more ... Network World.