Free Republic

The group of anonymous "hacktivists" that made headlines for online cyberattacks in December just released a bombshell online: a decrypted version of the same cyberworm that crippled Iran's nuclear power program. The ones and zeroes that make up the code called the Stuxnet worm -- described as the most sophisticated cyberweapon ever created -- were reportedly found when the faceless group hacked into the computers of HBGary, a U.S. security company that the anonymous collective viewed as an enemy. And the security experts FoxNews.com spoke with said the leaked code was serious cause for concern. "There is the real potential...

The Stuxnet software worm repeatedly sought to infect five industrial facilities in Iran over a 10-month period, a new report says, in what could be a clue into how it might have infected the Iranian uranium enrichment complex at Natanz. The report, released Friday by Symantec, a computer security software firm, said there were three waves of attacks. Liam O Murchu, a security researcher at the firm, said his team was able to chart the path of the infection because of an unusual feature of the malware: Stuxnet recorded information on the location and type of each computer it infected....

According to new intelligence reports, "Iran's Bushehr nuclear plant has been penetrated by a computer worm unleashed last year." When the plant comes online and is fully operational, this could lead to a Chernobyl-like meltdown. The virus could have disrupted several safety precautions in the plant's system. According to the report, the plant could meltdown with the "force of a small nuclear bomb." The report continues, "The minimum possible damage would be a meltdown of the reactor. However, external damage and massive environmental destruction could also occur... similar to the Chernobyl disaster..." Though Iran denies that the virus has affected...

The control systems of Iran's Bushehr nuclear plant have been penetrated by a computer worm unleashed last year, according to a foreign intelligence report that warns of a possible Chernobyl-like disaster once the site becomes fully operational. Russia's envoy to NATO, Dmitry Rogozin, also has raised the specter of the 1986 reactor explosion in Ukraine, but suggested last week that the danger had passed. The report, drawn up by a nation closely monitoring Iran's nuclear program and obtained by The Associated Press, said such conclusions were premature and based on the "casual assessment" of Russian and Iranian scientists at Bushehr.

The movie version is going to be great! Hot Air went way back to the Bush days and found an NYT report about Bush’s orders to find new covert ways to keep Iran’s nuclear program from progressing. "When President George W. Bush ordered new ways to slow Iran’s progress toward a nuclear bomb last year, he approved a plan for an experimental covert program — its results still unclear — to bore into their computers and undermine the project." Actually, the results are becoming quite clear. The joint U.S./Israeli team effort produced Stuxnet, the clever little cyberworm that is wreaking...

Greenlit by Dubya, accelerated by Obama. Or at least, that’s what the cyborg time travelers who brought the worm back from the future would have you believe.The evidence is only circumstantial, but … there’s an awful lot of it. Behind Dimona’s barbed wire, the experts say, Israel has spun nuclear centrifuges virtually identical to Iran’s at Natanz, where Iranian scientists are struggling to enrich uranium. They say Dimona tested the effectiveness of the Stuxnet computer worm, a destructive program that appears to have wiped out roughly a fifth of Iran’s nuclear centrifuges and helped delay, though not destroy, Tehran’s ability...

Iran dismisses reports on cyber virus on nuclear power plant22:02, January 18, 2011 A spokesman of Iranian Atomic Energy Organization (IAEO) dismissed reports about negative impacts of Stuxnet worm on Iran's nuclear facilities, local satellite Press TV reported on Tuesday. Hamid Khadem Qaemi, rejected the report of Daily Telegraph, alleging that Stuxnet computer virus has had a negative impact on the country's nuclear facilities. Khadem Qaemi said Tuesday that the Stuxnet worm has failed to influence the progressing activities of Bushehr nuclear power plant in southern Iran. "The Iranian atomic energy organization's security experts vigilantly identified the virus about one...

...The worm itself now appears to have included two major components. One was designed to send Iran’s nuclear centrifuges spinning wildly out of control. Another seems right out of the movies: The computer program also secretly recorded what normal operations at the nuclear plant looked like, then played those readings back to plant operators, like a pre-recorded security tape in a bank heist, so that it would appear that everything was operating normally while the centrifuges were actually tearing themselves apart. The attacks were not fully successful: Some parts of Iran’s operations ground to a halt, while others survived, according...

Russian nuclear scientists are providing technical assistance to Iran's attempts activate the country's first nuclear power plant at the Gulf port. But they have raised serious concerns about the extensive damage caused to the plant's computer systems by the mysterious Stuxnet virus, which was discovered last year and is widely believed to have been the result of a sophisticated joint US-Israeli cyber attack. According to Western intelligence reports, Russian scientists warned the Kremlin that they could be facing "another Chernobyl" if they were forced to comply with Iran's tight deadline to activate the complex this summer. After decades of delays...

Stuxnet Worm Was Weapon, Report SaysBy Gregg Keizer, Computerworld Jan 17, 2011 11:45 am The Stuxnet worm that disrupted Iran's ability to enrich uranium into bomb-grade nuclear fuel was jointly created by Israel and the U.S., the New York Times said Saturday. Citing confidential sources, the U.S. newspaper claimed that Israel's covert nuclear facility at Dimona was used to test the worm's effectiveness on centrifuges like the ones Iran employs at its Natanz complex, which has been plagued by technical problems. **SNIP** Langner, who has spent months pulling the worm apart, said earlier this week that Stuxnet was a natural...

It's called "an admission against interest" in legal circles. Example: When the New York Times says something good about George W. Bush. It was George W. Bush's fault, the NYT just confessed, that the Stuxnet computer worm ended up destroying 984 Iranian uranium centrifuges over the last year or so. Bush got the Stuxnet program started in cooperation with Israel and other countries in the last years of his presidency. Of course the Times buries the truth half-way down its long story on Stuxnet computer worm, instantly saying that when Obama found out about it he made the program speed...

TEHRAN — Iran’s Intelligence Ministry said on Monday that it had broken up an Israeli spy network linked to the assassination of an Iranian nuclear scientist last year, state-owned media said. After a broad investigation, Iran succeeded in arresting “the main agents behind the terrorist incident and dismantle a network comprising of Israeli spies and terrorists,” state-owned Press TV quoted the semi-official Fars news agency as saying. It said Israeli intelligence services “had used bases in certain European and non-European countries as well as Iran’s neighboring states in an attempt to achieve its inhuman and non-Islamic goals.” Those same “bases”...

The news agency quoted a report posted Wednesday on the IranNuc.ir website that said the Mossad “has a long record in assassinating Arab and Muslim scientists in collaboration with its U.S. and British counterparts (CIA and MI6).” The report listed nearly a dozen scientists from Egypt, Lebanon and elsewhere whom it claimed were assassinated by the Mossad.

It appears Israel used the computer virus Stuxnet to destroy Iran's nuclear weapons programme as effectively as bombing it --- centrifuges appeared to be working propertly, but made a useless blend of U238/U235 and gradually spun out of control, destroying themselves. Futher, the software reported back and informed on what users actually did work, so the scientists could be given their virgin gifts early. All the respect, Mossad! As a bonus, the related nuke plant looks like a future Chernobyl, according to the Russians, who are too scared to flip the on switch, because of the many viruses hiding in...

The New York Times reported rather conclusively on Saturday that the super-advanced computer virus that has at least partially crippled Iran’s nuclear program was developed and tested by Israel, with American involvement. Known as Stuxnet, the virus was first identified “in the wild” about two years ago. About one year ago, it infected the computers that control the uranium enrichment plant at Natanz in central Iran. By all accounts, Stuxnet has to date managed to knock out 984 centrifuges and has, according to Israeli officials, set back Iran’s nuclear program by a good three-to-four years. According to the report, the...

Russia warns of ‘Iranian Chernobyl'By Con Coughlin 5:23PM GMT 16 Jan 2011 Russian nuclear scientists are providing technical assistance to Iran's attempts activate the country's first nuclear power plant at the Gulf port. But they have raised serious concerns about the extensive damage caused to the plant's computer systems by the mysterious Stuxnet virus, which was discovered last year and is widely believed to have been the result of a sophisticated joint US-Israeli cyber attack. According to Western intelligence reports, Russian scientists warned the Kremlin that they could be facing "another Chernobyl" if they were forced to comply with Iran's...

In the New York Times story today that details information on the Stuxnet computer worm that ended up destroying 984 Iranian unranium centrifuges, an interesting “item” pops out. Not immediately, not in the New York Times. But about half way through the story we find out that President Bush got the Stuxnet started in 2008 with Israel. He even managed to get the cooperation of Germany, Britain and the Saudis. Not bad for someone the world supposedly hated. Then, near the end of the piece, we find out that we got a lot of material from Libya after it gave...

WASHINGTON -- Israel has tested a computer worm believed to have sabotaged Iran's nuclear centrifuges and slowed its ability to develop an atomic weapon, The New York Times reported Saturday. In what the Times described as a joint Israeli-U.S. effort to undermine Iran's nuclear ambitions, it said the tests of the destructive Stuxnet worm had occurred over the past two years at the heavily guarded Dimona complex in the Negev desert.

The Dimona complex in the Negev desert is famous as the heavily guarded heart of Israel’s never-acknowledged nuclear arms program, where neat rows of factories make atomic fuel for the arsenal. Over the past two years, according to intelligence and military experts familiar with its operations, Dimona has taken on a new, equally secret role — as a critical testing ground in a joint American and Israeli effort to undermine Iran’s efforts to make a bomb of its own.

Report: Israel used centrifuges identical to those in Iran to test out worm that set Teheran's nuclear program years back; virus was authorized by Bush administration, rather than allow an Israeli attack. Israel tested the Stuxnet virus in Dimona, according to a Sunday report by The New York Times. Israel reportedly has centrifuges that are identical to those at the Iranian nuclear site in Natanz, which were used to test the Stuxnet computer worm. In 2008, the Times reported, German company Siemens cooperated with the Idaho National Laboratory, allowing it to identify problems in the comany's computer controllers, which are...