But the fact that Colonial had to shut down the country's largest gasoline pipeline underscores just how vulnerable the U.S. cyber infrastructure is to criminals and national adversaries, such as Russia, China and Iran, experts say. "This could be the most impactful ransomware attack in history, a cyber disaster turning into a real-world catastrophe," said Andrew Rubin, CEO and co-founder of Illumio, a cybersecurity company. "It's an absolute nightmare, and it's a recurring nightmare," he said. "Organizations continue to rely and invest entirely on detection, as if they can stop all breaches from happening. But this approach misses attacks over and over again. Before the next inevitable breach, the president and Congress need to take action on our broken security model."