There’s a computer worm making life miserable in manufacturing complexes and other heavy industries around the world right now. Known as Stuxnet, the worm targets not personal computers, but industrial control boards and the like from manufacturer Siemens, who makes mostly industrial control devices. It’s interesting in that it has such a limited scope, but that’s by design. Industrial security systems expert Ralph Langner believes Stuxnet was designed to disable Iran’s Bushehr nuclear reactor in the world’s first official state-sponsored cyber-war.
“This is not some hacker sitting in the basement of his parents’ house. To me, it seems that the resources needed to stage this attack point to a nation state,” says Langner. He believes the worm was designed to attack Siemens software because Iran’s nuclear reactor runs off Siemens PLC software. If it is a worm designed by an industry insider working for a nation-state (and given its limited range of attack and very specific coding, it very well can be), what Stuxnet can be considered is the world’s first cyber-super-weapon designed to take out a specific, real-world target.
It also might be the first bombing run in a cyber-war that nobody wants. Other countries (North Korea and China) have engaged in small-scale cyber war and organized hacking, but this might be the first Western-lead cyber-attack.
Tags: Stuxnet, Bushehr nuclear plant, computer virus, computer worm, computer worm designed to disable Iranian nuclear plant, Iran, Iranian nuclear program, cyber-super-weapon, first cyber-super-weapon designed to take out a real-world target, cyber war, Siemens, Ralph Langner, computer worm developed by nation-state
