Operational Twilight: APTs, OT, & geopolitics of a dying climate
Cybelle Oliveira
DEF CON 33 (backfill) · Day 1 · Main Stage
In an increasingly volatile global landscape, Cybelle Oliveira, a prominent CTI researcher and founder of Lavilla Hacker, presented a compelling and urgent talk at DEF CON titled "Operational Twilight: APTs, OT, & geopolitics of a dying climate." Her presentation unveiled a critical and often overlooked nexus: the strategic weaponization of extreme weather and climate events by nation-state Advanced Persistent Threats (APTs) to amplify the impact of cyberattacks on critical infrastructure. Oliveira argues that this emerging threat vector demands a fundamental shift in how the cybersecurity community approaches defense, particularly in the realm of **Operational Technology (OT)**.
AI review
Oliveira identifies a genuinely interesting threat framing — APTs timing attacks to weather windows — and grounds it in a real case study (Sandworm/Industroyer2 in Ukraine). The core insight is valid and underexplored at scale, but the talk leans heavily on a CTI narrative layer over technical substance that's mostly already documented, and the statistics get thrown around in ways that invite skepticism.