(Christian Science Monitor) Mark Clayton - A cyber worm, called Stuxnet, may be the world's first known cyberweapon designed specifically to destroy a real-world target. One expert suggests Stuxnet may have already attacked its target - Iran's Bushehr nuclear power plant. Stuxnet employs amazing new tricks, like taking control of a computer system without the user taking any action or clicking any button other than inserting an infected memory stick. It targets and infiltrates industrial supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) software used to run chemical plants and factories as well as electric power plants and transmission systems worldwide, takes control of the automated factory control systems, and does whatever it was programmed to do with them. Ralph Langner, a German cyber-security researcher, described Stuxnet as essentially a precision, military-grade cyber missile deployed to seek out and destroy a real-world target of high importance. "This is a 100% sabotage attack," he said. Three top U.S. industrial control system security experts confirmed his findings. "This is the first direct example of weaponized software, highly customized and designed to find a particular target," says Michael Assante, former chief of industrial control systems cyber security research at the U.S. Department of Energy's Idaho National Laboratory. A geographical distribution of computers hit by Stuxnet found Iran to be the apparent epicenter of the infections.
2010-09-27 08:55:57Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive