How to short-circuit the US power grid
Found on New Scientist on Thursday, 10 September 2009
Their aim was to examine the potential for cascade failures, where a major power outage in a subnetwork results in power being dumped into an adjacent subnetwork, causing a chain reaction of failures.
"An attack on the nodes with the lowest loads can be a more effective way to destroy the electrical power grid of the western US due to cascading failures," Wang says.
"A determined attacker would not fool around with the electricity inputs or whatever - they need only a bunch of guys with some Semtex to blow up the grid lines near a power station."
Which points out the obvious: while research and the careful choosing of targets sure is important, brute force can be as equally effective.