{"id":685418,"date":"2025-08-16T10:00:29","date_gmt":"2025-08-16T07:00:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/how-your-solar-rooftop-became-a-national-security-issue-2\/"},"modified":"2025-08-16T10:00:29","modified_gmt":"2025-08-16T07:00:29","slug":"how-your-solar-rooftop-became-a-national-security-issue-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/how-your-solar-rooftop-became-a-national-security-issue-2\/","title":{"rendered":"How your solar rooftop became a national security issue"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"ez-toc-container\" class=\"ez-toc-v2_0_84 counter-hierarchy ez-toc-counter ez-toc-custom ez-toc-container-direction\">\n<p class=\"ez-toc-title\" style=\"cursor:inherit\">Table of Contents<\/p>\n<label for=\"ez-toc-cssicon-toggle-item-6a22f2ec6d518\" class=\"ez-toc-cssicon-toggle-label\"><span class=\"\"><span class=\"eztoc-hide\" style=\"display:none;\">Toggle<\/span><span class=\"ez-toc-icon-toggle-span\"><svg style=\"fill: #dd3333;color:#dd3333\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\" class=\"list-377408\" width=\"20px\" height=\"20px\" viewBox=\"0 0 24 24\" fill=\"none\"><path d=\"M6 6H4v2h2V6zm14 0H8v2h12V6zM4 11h2v2H4v-2zm16 0H8v2h12v-2zM4 16h2v2H4v-2zm16 0H8v2h12v-2z\" fill=\"currentColor\"><\/path><\/svg><svg style=\"fill: #dd3333;color:#dd3333\" class=\"arrow-unsorted-368013\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\" width=\"10px\" height=\"10px\" viewBox=\"0 0 24 24\" version=\"1.2\" baseProfile=\"tiny\"><path d=\"M18.2 9.3l-6.2-6.3-6.2 6.3c-.2.2-.3.4-.3.7s.1.5.3.7c.2.2.4.3.7.3h11c.3 0 .5-.1.7-.3.2-.2.3-.5.3-.7s-.1-.5-.3-.7zM5.8 14.7l6.2 6.3 6.2-6.3c.2-.2.3-.5.3-.7s-.1-.5-.3-.7c-.2-.2-.4-.3-.7-.3h-11c-.3 0-.5.1-.7.3-.2.2-.3.5-.3.7s.1.5.3.7z\"\/><\/svg><\/span><\/span><\/label><input type=\"checkbox\"  id=\"ez-toc-cssicon-toggle-item-6a22f2ec6d518\" checked aria-label=\"Toggle\" \/><nav><ul class='ez-toc-list ez-toc-list-level-1 ' ><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-2'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-1\" href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/how-your-solar-rooftop-became-a-national-security-issue-2\/#Security_shortcomings_and_customers_complaints\" >Security shortcomings and customers\u2019 complaints<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-2'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-2\" href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/how-your-solar-rooftop-became-a-national-security-issue-2\/#Connections_to_China_spark_security_concerns\" >Connections to China spark security concerns<\/a><\/li><\/ul><\/nav><\/div>\n<div>\n<p id=\"speakable-summary\" class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">James Showalter describes a pretty specific if not entirely implausible nightmare scenario. Someone drives up to your house, cracks your Wi-Fi password, and then starts messing with the solar inverter mounted beside your garage \u2014 that unassuming gray box that converts the direct current from your rooftop panels into the alternating current that powers your home.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cYou\u2019ve got to have a solar stalker\u201d for this scenario to play out, says Showalter, describing the kind of person who would need to physically show up in your driveway with both the technical know-how and the motivation to hack your home energy system.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Showalter, the CEO of <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/eg4electronics.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">EG4 Electronics<\/a>, a company based in Sulphur Springs, Texas, doesn\u2019t consider this sequence of events particularly likely. Still, it\u2019s why his company last week found itself in the spotlight when U.S. cybersecurity agency CISA <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.cisa.gov\/news-events\/ics-advisories\/icsa-25-219-07\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">published an advisory<\/a> detailing security vulnerabilities in EG4\u2019s solar inverters. The flaws, CISA noted, could allow an attacker with access to the same network as an affected inverter and its serial number to intercept data, install malicious firmware, or seize control of the whole system.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">For the roughly 55,000 customers who own EG4\u2019s affected inverter model, the episode probably felt like an unsettling introduction to a device that they little understand. What they\u2019re learning is that modern solar inverters aren\u2019t simple power converters anymore. They now serve as the backbone of home energy installations, monitoring performance, communicating with utility companies, and, when there\u2019s excess power, feeding it back into the grid.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Much of this has h<a href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/category\/download-scripts-themes-apps\/\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"9\" title=\"Download Scripts &amp; Themes &amp; Apps\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">app<\/a>ened without people noticing. \u201cNobody knew what the hell a solar inverter was five years ago,\u201d observes Justin Pascale, a principal consultant at Dragos, a cybersecurity firm that specializes in industrial systems. \u201cNow we\u2019re talking about it at the national and international level.\u201d<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-security-shortcomings-and-customers-complaints\"><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Security_shortcomings_and_customers_complaints\"><\/span>Security shortcomings and customers\u2019 complaints<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h2>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Some of the numbers highlight the degree to which individual homes in the U.S. are becoming miniature power plants. According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, small-scale solar installations \u2014 primarily residential \u2014 grew <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.eia.gov\/energyexplained\/electricity\/electricity-in-the-us.php\">more than fivefold<\/a> between 2014 and 2022. What was once the province of climate advocates and early adopters became more mainstream owing to falling costs, government incentives, and a growing awareness of climate change.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Each solar installation adds another node to an expanding network of interconnected devices, each one contributing to energy independence but also becoming a potential entry point for someone with malicious intent.<\/p>\n<div class=\"wp-block-techcrunch-inline-cta\">\n<div class=\"inline-cta__wrapper\">\n<p>Techcrunch event<\/p>\n<div class=\"inline-cta__content\">\n<p>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<span class=\"inline-cta__location\">San Francisco<\/span><br \/>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<span class=\"inline-cta__separator\">|<\/span><br \/>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<span class=\"inline-cta__date\">October 27-29, 2025<\/span>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">When pressed about his company\u2019s security standards, Showalter acknowledges its shortcomings, but he also deflects. \u201cThis is not an EG4 problem,\u201d he says. \u201cThis is an industry-wide problem.\u201d Over a Zoom call and later, in this editor\u2019s inbox, he produced a <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/dersec.io\/download-whitepaper\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">14-page report<\/a> cataloguing 88 solar energy vulnerability disclosures across commercial and residential applications since 2019.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Not all of his customers \u2014 some of whom <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/SolarDIY\/comments\/1mm7kak\/eg4_solar_inverter_security_vulnerabilities_cisa\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">took to Reddit<\/a> to complain \u2014 are sympathetic, particularly given that CISA\u2019s advisory revealed fundamental design flaws: communication between monitoring applications and inverters that occurred in unencrypted plain text, firmware updates that lacked integrity checks, and rudimentary authentication procedures.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cThese were fundamental security lapses,\u201d says one customer of the company, who asked to speak anonymously. \u201cAdding insult to injury,\u201d continues this individual, \u201cEG4 didn\u2019t even bother to notify me or offer suggested mitigations.\u201d <\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Asked why EG4 didn\u2019t alert customers straightaway when CISA reached out to the company, Showalter calls it a \u201clive and learn\u201d moment. <\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cBecause we\u2019re so close [to addressing CISA\u2019s concerns] and it\u2019s such a positive relationship with CISA, we were going to get to the \u2018done\u2019 button, and then advise people, so we\u2019re not in the middle of the cake being baked,\u201d says Showalter.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">TechCrunch reached out to CISA earlier this week for more information; the agency has not responded. In its advisory about EG4, CISA states that \u201cno known public exploitation specifically targeting these vulnerabilities has been reported to CISA at this time.\u201d<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-connections-to-china-spark-security-concerns\"><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Connections_to_China_spark_security_concerns\"><\/span>Connections to China spark security concerns<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h2>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">While unrelated, the timing of EG4\u2019s public relations crisis coincides with broader anxieties about the supply chain security of renewable energy equipment. <\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Earlier this year, U.S. energy officials reportedly began reassessing risks posed by devices made in China after discovering unexplained communication equipment inside some inverters and batteries. <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.reuters.com\/sustainability\/climate-energy\/ghost-machine-rogue-communication-devices-found-chinese-inverters-2025-05-14\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">According to a Reuters investigation<\/a>, undocumented cellular radios and other communication devices were found in equipment from multiple Chinese suppliers \u2014 components that hadn\u2019t appeared on official hardware lists.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This reported discovery carries particular weight given China\u2019s dominance in solar manufacturing. That same Reuters story noted that Huawei is the world\u2019s largest supplier of inverters, accounting for 29% of shipments globally in 2022, followed by Chinese peers Sungrow and Ginlong Solis. Some <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/esmc.solar\/restrict-remote-access-of-pv-inverters-from-high-risk-vendors\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">200 GW of European solar power capacity<\/a> is linked to inverters made in China, which is roughly equivalent to more than 200 nuclear power plants.<\/p>\n<p>The geopolitical implications haven\u2019t escaped notice. Lithuania last year <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.pv-magazine.com\/2024\/11\/18\/lithuania-bans-remote-chinese-access-to-solar-wind-storage-devices\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">passed a law<\/a> blocking remote Chinese access to solar, wind, and battery installations above 100 kilowatts, effectively restricting the use of Chinese inverters. Showalter says his company is responding to customer concerns by similarly starting to move away from Chinese suppliers and toward components made by companies elsewhere, including in Germany.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">But the vulnerabilities CISA described in EG4\u2019s systems raise questions that extend beyond any single company\u2019s practices or where it sources its components. The U.S. standards agency NIST <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nccoe.nist.gov\/projects\/cybersecurity-smart-inverters-guidelines-residential-and-light-commercial-solar-energy\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">warns<\/a> that \u201cif you remotely control a large enough number of home solar inverters, and do something nefarious at once, that could have catastrophic implications to the grid for a prolonged period of time.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The good <a href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/category\/news\/\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"2\" title=\"News\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">news<\/a> (if there is any), is that while theoretically possible, this scenario faces a lot of practical limitations. <\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Pascale, who works with utility-scale solar installations, notes that residential inverters serve primarily two functions: converting power from direct to alternating current, and facilitating the connection back to the grid. A mass attack would require compromising vast numbers of individual homes simultaneously. (Such attacks are not impossible but are more likely to involve targeting the manufacturers themselves, some of which have remote access to their customers\u2019 solar inverters, as <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.bloomberg.com\/news\/articles\/2024-12-12\/europe-s-power-grid-vulnerable-to-hackers-exploiting-rooftop-solar-panels\">evidenced by security researchers last year<\/a>.)<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The regulatory framework that governs larger installations does not right now extend to residential systems. The North American Electric Reliability Corporation\u2019s Critical Infrastructure Protection standards <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.certrec.com\/blog\/understanding-nercs-new-20-to-75-mva-compliance-requirements\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">currently apply<\/a> only to larger facilities producing 75 megawatts or more, like solar farms.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Because residential installations fall so far below these thresholds, they operate in a regulatory gray zone where cybersecurity standards remain suggestions rather than requirements.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">But the end result is that the security of thousands of small installations depends largely on the discretion of individual manufacturers that are operating in a regulatory vacuum. <\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">On the issue of unencrypted data transmission, for example, which is one reason EG4 received that slap on the hand from CISA, Pascale notes that in utility-scale operational environments, plain text transmission is common and sometimes encouraged for network-monitoring purposes.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cWhen you look at encryption in an enterprise environment, it is not allowed,\u201d he explains. \u201cBut when you look at an operational environment, most things are transmitted in plain text.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Put another way, the real concern isn\u2019t an im<a href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/category\/social-mediaa\/\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"1\" title=\"Social Media\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">media<\/a>te threat to individual homeowners. Instead it ties to the aggregate vulnerability of a rapidly expanding network. As the energy grid becomes increasingly distributed, with power flowing from millions of small sources rather than dozens of large ones, the attack surface expands exponentially. Each inverter represents a potential pressure point in a system that was never designed to accommodate this level of complexity.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Showalter has embraced CISA\u2019s intervention as what he calls a \u201ctrust upgrade\u201d \u2014 an opportunity to differentiate his company in a crowded market. He says that since June, EG4 has worked with the agency to address the identified vulnerabilities, reducing an initial list of 10 concerns to three remaining items that the company expects to resolve by October. The process has involved updating firmware transmission protocols, implementing additional identity verification for technical support calls, and redesigning authentication procedures.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">But for those like the anonymous EG4 customer who spoke with frustration about the company\u2019s response, the episode highlights the odd position that solar adopters find themselves in. They purchased what they understood to be climate-friendly tech, only to discover they\u2019d become unwitting participants in a knotty cybersecurity landscape that few seem to fully comprehend.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<blockquote><p><strong><span style=\"color: #ff6600;\">If you liked the article, do not forget to share it with your friends. Follow us on\u00a0<span style=\"color: #ff0000;\"><a style=\"color: #ff0000;\" href=\"https:\/\/news.google.com\/publications\/CAAqBwgKMN63nwsw68G3Aw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\">Google News<\/a><\/span>\u00a0too, click on the star and choose us from your favorites.<\/span><\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<blockquote>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><strong>If you want to read more like this article, you can visit our <span style=\"color: #ff9900;\"><a style=\"color: #ff9900;\" href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/category\/technology\/\" target=\"_blank\" >Technology<\/a><\/span> category.<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p><span style=\"color: black;\"><a style=\"color: #ff9900;\" href=\"https:\/\/techcrunch.com\/2025\/08\/15\/how-your-solar-rooftop-became-a-national-security-issue\/\" target=\"_blank\" >Source<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>James Showalter describes a pretty specific if not entirely implausible nightmare scenario. Someone drives up to your house, cracks your Wi-Fi password, and then starts messing with the solar inverter mounted beside your garage \u2014 that unassuming gray box that converts the direct current from your rooftop panels into the alternating current that powers your&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":685419,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/techcrunch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/06\/GettyImages-1308318231.jpg?resize=1200,800","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[70375,151537,71525,72287,123603],"class_list":["post-685418","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-technology","tag-cybersecurity","tag-government-policy","tag-national-security","tag-security","tag-solar"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/685418","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=685418"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/685418\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/685419"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=685418"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=685418"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=685418"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}