Solar grids could be hijacked and even potentially disabled by these security flaws

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Power grids could be disrupted and damaged, experts warn

Power cables stretching out in front of the horizon
(Image credit: Image Credit: jplenio / Pixabay)
  • Experts claim solar inverter vulnerabilities could lead to damage to the power grid
  • Devices could be taken over and switched off, increasing grid load
  • 46 vulnerabilities discovered, with some potentially exposing user information

Solar inverters could be hijacked by cybercriminals to disrupt power supplies and damage the electrical grid.

46 vulnerabilities were found by Forescout [PDF] in solar inverters produced by Sungrow, Growatt, and SMA.

Many of the vulnerabilities could lead to remote code execution (RCE), denial of service, device takeover, as well as access to cloud platforms and sensitive information.

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Power grid hijacking

For SMA devices, only a single vulnerability was found, CVE-2025-0731, that allows an attacker to use a demo account to upload a .aspx (Active Server Page Extended) file instead of a photovoltaic (PV) system picture, with the file then being executed by the sunnyportal.com web server.

As for Sungrow solar inverters, insecure direct object reference (IDOR) vulnerabilities tracked as CVE-2024-50685, CVE-2024-50686, and CVE-2024-50693 could allow an attacker to harvest communication dongle serial numbers.

CVE-2024-50692 allows an attacker to use hard-coded MQTT credentials to send arbitrary commands to an arbitrary inverter dongle, or commit man-in-the-middle (MitM) attacks against MQTT communications.

The attacker can also use one of several critical stack overflow vulnerabilities (CVE-2024-50694, CVE-2024-50695, CVE-2024-50698) to remotely execute code on server connected dongles. Using this flow of vulnerabilities, an attacker could potentially reduce power generation during peak times to increase the load on the grid.

Growatt inverters can be hijacked via the cloud backend by listing usernames from an exposed Growatt API, and then use these usernames for account-takeover through two IDOR vulnerabilities.

All of the disclosed vulnerabilities have since been patched by the manufacturers.

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Benedict Collins
Benedict Collins
Senior Writer, Security

Benedict has been writing about security issues for over 7 years, first focusing on geopolitics and international relations while at the University of Buckingham. During this time he studied BA Politics with Journalism, for which he received a second-class honours (upper division), then continuing his studies at a postgraduate level, achieving a distinction in MA Security, Intelligence and Diplomacy. Upon joining TechRadar Pro as a Staff Writer, Benedict transitioned his focus towards cybersecurity, exploring state-sponsored threat actors, malware, social engineering, and national security. Benedict is also an expert on B2B security products, including firewalls, antivirus, endpoint security, and password management.

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