Uttar Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam Limited

Profile narrative

Uttar Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam Limited (UHBVN) is a power distribution utility headquartered in India. The organisation is responsible for delivering electricity to consumers in the state of Haryana. Its core services include providing new electricity connections, processing bill payments, and registering consumer complaints. UHBVN operates an official website that enables online access to these services. For billing purposes, the utility employs an Automatic Meter Reading System to capture consumption data. The organisation serves both residential and industrial customers across its service area.

In May 2025, a cyberattack disabled UHBVN's website, disrupting online services such as new connections, bill payments, and complaint registration for more than 50,000 consumers. The incident prompted the utility’s IT and cybersecurity teams to mobilise for assessment and remediation, with officials estimating service restoration within 48 hours. A earlier incident in March 2018 targeted the same Automatic Meter Reading System, encrypting billing data for approximately 4,000 industrial consumers. Attackers demanded a ransom in Bitcoin, leading to an FIR under the IT Act and extortion laws, while the organisation confirmed that backups allowed swift restoration of billing. The 2018 breach affected payment records for mid‑sized industrial consumers spread across nine operational circles of the utility. Following the 2018 attack, UHBVN accelerated plans to replace the legacy meter reading system with a more secure infrastructure by mid‑2018. After both events, the utility issued advisories urging consumers to avoid suspicious links and to use offline channels for service requests until full restoration.

Incidents

2 incidents linked to this organisation.