Behind the US/Israeli Cyberattacks on Iran
Megha Rajagopalan writes at ProPublica
The New York Times [has] published a report detailing how the Bush and Obama administrations created the cyberweapon known as Stuxnet and used it to disrupt Iran’s uranium enrichment program.
Much has been written about Stuxnet, which, as ProPublica recently reported, remains a threat beyond Iran. But the Times account, based on interviews with unnamed U.S. and Israeli officials, is the most extensive account to date of U.S. cyberwarfare capabilities. Here’s our cheat sheet on what’s new and the fallout:
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As the Times points out, “No country’s infrastructure is more dependent on computer systems, and thus more vulnerable to attack, than that of the United States.” Siemens makes specialized industrial controllers that were targeted by the Olympic Games attacks. As Siemens confirmed to ProPublica, the same hardware and software holes Stuxnet took advantage of in Iran exist in thousands of locations in the U.S. and worldwide. The vulnerable equipment controls everything from natural gas pipelines to refineries and power transmission lines.
American cybersecurity experts have long warned that it’s only a matter of time before someone turns an equally destructive cyberweapon on our own systems. Now that Stuxnet’s origins are clear, the odds of that happening might be even higher.
http://www.juancole.com/2012/06/behind-the-usisraeli-cyberattacks-on-iran.html
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