Posted on 06/10/2015 1:11:53 PM PDT by Theoria
Earlier this spring, the cybersecurity firm Kaspersky was testing an advanced antivirus software on one of its computers when it stumbled on something big: As the Moscow-based company puts it, it was "one of the most skilled, mysterious and powerful" spy viruses in the world.
The piece of software was so sophisticated that it left few traces. It didn't leave files on the disk drive, and to stay hidden, it burrowed inside a computer's kernel memory, which is the place where a computer's most basic software is kept.
Kaspersky says it assigned a team to watch its movements, and the team members found out they were dealing with Duqu — a malware program that previous reports had connected to the Israeli government.
Subsequently, Kaspersky launched a worldwide search for the virus on millions of computers and discovered it in three luxury hotels in Europe. All of those hotels, Kaspersky says, were used during talks between Iran and Western powers over Iran's nuclear deal.
The Wall Street Journal, which first reported the story, adds:
"Researchers at the company acknowledge that many questions remain unanswered about how the virus was used and what information may have been stolen. Among the possibilities, the researchers say, the intruders might have been able to eavesdrop on conversations and steal electronic files by commandeering the hotel systems that connect to computers, phones, elevators and alarms, allowing them to turn them on and off at will to collect information.
(Excerpt) Read more at npr.org ...
Wired has an article with a great deal more information on this here: http://www.wired.com/2015/06/kaspersky-finds-new-nation-state-attack-network/ it will give you a much different take on this information. Kaspersky themselves were infected, and they don’t seem to know for how long.
dayglowred. I think you might find this interesting if you haven’t already seen it.
Virus fallout. That is one of the side effects of such uses. Stuxnet hit computers all over the world. Anyone liable for that one?
Thing is, it looks like Kaspersky was intentionally targeted. The Hotel thing is interesting, but Kaspersky had some juicy info available for the hackers. They still don’t know what they may have had compromised.
Very impressive stuff. And probably not even ‘offensive’ use. Dunno what their shutdown stuff is. ouch
Yes indeed I do! Thank you for the ping.
+1
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