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The Stuxnet worm may be the most sophisticated software ever written

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Re: The Stuxnet worm may be the most sophisticated software ever written

#501

Post by bcaa7f3a8bbc »

muthdra wrote: post #497
eberkund wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But do those things really contribute to the sophistication of the software? For example imagine some code written with no understanding of uranium enrichment: const int CENTRIFUGE_RPM = 500; And then some other code written with a deep understanding of uranium enrichment: const int CENTRIFUGE_RPM = 1203; Can you really say that the second bit of code is more "complex"? Same goes for stolen driver signing keys and so…

>Can you really say that the second bit of code is more "complex"? Yes. Take fastinvsqrt() for example. Cleve Moler learned about this trick from code written by William Kahan and K.C. Ng at Berkeley around 1986. float fastInvSqrt(float x) { int i = *(int*)&x; i = 0x5f3759df - (i >> 1); float y = *(float*)&i; return y * (1.5F - 0.5F * x * y * y); } Simple instructions, VERY complex code. Not as complex as this one, t…

A model aircraft can be simple, but an understanding of principles for designing it can be hard. IMHO, these two pieces of code are extremely simple, in terms of logic, instructions and computations. But they are sophisticated, the second is even more sophisticated than the first.

Root of the debate: words are not well-defined.

Re: The Stuxnet worm may be the most sophisticated software ever written

#502

Post by INTPenis »

0xTJ wrote: post #247
INTPenis wrote: post #237

How do you define sophisticated? Complex or elegant? Because if it's more towards the latter then I'd suggest the software that took humans to the moon and back, several times, is much more sophisticated. But from reading the article it seems the author is aiming more for complex than elegant.

I'd say it's got both. It's extremely complex, but it does what it needs so cleanly. I'd argue that it's extraordinarily elegant.

Anything complex that also does what it's supposed to does of course have some inherent elegance but that doesn't mean I'd call stuxnet elegant.

It would be elegant if they could accomplish what they did with less code, relying on fewer exploits and perhaps even without the reliance on stolen private keys from other corporations.

Having stolen private keys from hardware vendors is pretty brute force to me.

Re: The Stuxnet worm may be the most sophisticated software ever written

#503

Post by kazinator »

coldtea wrote: post #290
eberkund wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But do those things really contribute to the sophistication of the software? For example imagine some code written with no understanding of uranium enrichment: const int CENTRIFUGE_RPM = 500; And then some other code written with a deep understanding of uranium enrichment: const int CENTRIFUGE_RPM = 1203; Can you really say that the second bit of code is more "complex"? Same goes for stolen driver signing keys and so…

> Can you really say that the second bit of code is more "complex"? Yes. Complexity in the sense discussed is related to the domain knowledge (including CS knowledge) required for the program to be written and work well. Else even a trivial BS program could be very complex, just sprinkle it with gotos and unnecessarily convoluted code...

Stringing together independent pieces doesn't produce a significant rise in complexity.

For instance, the payload which specifically looks for uranium centrifuge hardware is independent of the worm which carries the payload. They can be developed separately, by different people, and combined.

That specific worm could carry a payload to attack anything.

Or, that specific payload could be carried by any worm.

There is next to no coupling between "worm" and "payload".

Re: The Stuxnet worm may be the most sophisticated software ever written

#505

Post by steego »

bambataa wrote: post #480
steego wrote: post #478

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I honestly didn't invest too much time playing out scenarios out in my head, rather I was mentally recalling events in modern history where we've simply allowed millions of people to starve. From a BBC article: The scarcity, Mukherjee writes, was caused by large-scale exports of food from India for use in the war theatres and consumption in Britain - India exported more than 70,000 tonnes of rice between January and…

Should there be some catastrophic collapse in society, I would far prefer that the government requisitioned food and rationed it out. While it’s definitely open to abuse, I think it would do a better job in the short term of keeping people alive. A free market response to a national emergency sounds dreadful to me

I don't disagree. Most times, I would prefer the decisions of how people get the things they need are made by a network of people with incentives to provide and profit rather than central planning. However, if the situation is dire and the incentives create a deadlock, I think thought-out, extraordinary measures to help people are warranted.

Re: The Stuxnet worm may be the most sophisticated software ever written

#506

Post by ghostsofhistory »

7952 wrote: post #403
vertexFarm wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For all the evidence we have, MAD has worked. Still here. Still no WWIII. At the beginning of the twentieth century it was looking like we'd have another world war every twenty years or so for the rest of time. As best we can tell, nukes actually did end large-scale war. I would call that at least a partially mitigated disaster.

Do we really have enough data to draw conclusions? A nuclear war could break out in ten years time and be orders of magnitude worse than WWII. That would invalidate MAD in an instant. Nuclear weapons create a requirement that you safety depends on the pragmatism and sanity of leaders and government. Not only of your own country but your enemies.

The patterns of history suggest we are heading for unclear war. Power (manifested as interest) has been present in every conflict - no exception. Every nation eventually gets the war it is trying to avoid - nuclear war too. Decision-makers delude themselves that the course they are on will not lead to annihilation, but it always does. World leaders are deluding themselves now. Read more at: http://www.ghostsofhistory.wordpress.com/

Re: The Stuxnet worm may be the most sophisticated software ever written

#507

Post by toong »

Cthulhu_ wrote: post #175
toong wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Without power, logistics & supply lines stop working, no more groceries after a few days, riots and plunderings in the streets a week later...

Anything that doesn't require refrigeration would still work though, trucks run on diesel after all. Which makes me concerned about the future; if the transport network becomes electric, a power outage will cripple things even more. Unless we build self-contained, internet-disconnected charging stations maybe, but that's not going to be done at any kind of significant scale.

I think your missing the point.

You can maybe drive a truck, but there is a lot more to a logistics pipeline then actually driving the truck. Without power the whole scheduling automation etc. has to be done manually, and it's by now simply impossible to do every automated job manually again.

Your logistics pipelines could maybe run at a few percent efficiency if every step is manual, but by then your trucks will be raided on the streets.

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