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US and Israel created Stuxnet, lost control of it

arstechnica.com

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Re: US and Israel created Stuxnet, lost control of it

#251

Post by pyre »

Difwif wrote: post #240
jerf wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The physical terrorism threat is negligible. The generalized cheap-attack-with-disproportionate-damage threat I can't in good conscience write off quite so readily. Biological attacks are still scarily possible, and if we start talking computer viruses it becomes scarier again. Recall Stuxnet didn't merely inconvenience people, it destroyed hardware. If someone manages to write a virus that, say, destroys a significa…

Your fear about computer attacks appears to be a bit sensationalized and a typical knee jerk doomsday reaction. You parrot that "Electricity is the lifeblood of civilization" and that people will die when the power goes off but then seem to forget that blackouts already occur in highly populated areas. Are they a major annoyance? Of course! Do they cause mass death larger then asteroid impacts? Where did you get that…

I'm thinking that terrorists would have to do enough damage to warrant full replacement of a number (n = ?) of turbines at a number (m = ?) of plants to do significant, lasting damage in an area (you won't necessarily have a 'back-up turbine' lying around).

Re: US and Israel created Stuxnet, lost control of it

#253

Post by marshray »

Pelayo wrote: post #234
ck2 wrote: post #28

It's a new cold war. Eventually Iran will write viruses in return to attack US power grid. All fun and games until Homeland Security Theater is given new powers to raid your home and shoot your dog if they think your computer is being used as part of a botnet.

That's one thing I've never understood. Why is the power grid connected to the Internet? Does it need to be?

The power companies and grid are just like everybody else with a distributed system these days: they have a lot of monitoring data and the cheapest way to backhaul it is over the commodity internet. They find VPNs useful too.

True that a finely crafted USB stick can be used to bridge an air gap, but the power grid needs to not be connected to the interent. It's a protocol layering violation: the internet depends on the power grid. If the power grid also depends on the internet, what happens when one goes down for any length of time? How long would it take to get such a system turned back on again?

Re: US and Israel created Stuxnet, lost control of it

#254

Post by marshray »

oh_sigh wrote: post #118
rodolphoarruda wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't say Iran has the means (a.k.a knowledge) to go ahead and deploy the whole thing: virus development, infiltration, infection of devices within the power grid, and coming out unnoticed.

Way to show your ignorance. Maybe your comment would be interesting if you provided a single reason or fact to back up your claims. Since you don't it sounds like "Hurr, America number one, Iran savages". Iran has one of the most sophisticated intelligence apparatuses in the world(just ask the CIA what they think about them), and incredibly talented people at their fingertips. Individuals within their organizations a…

Iran showed some capabilities in the hacking of public certificate authorities last year (Comodo, Diginotar).

But there were plenty of noob mistakes made during those attacks too. They simply haven't shown the same type of capabilities to conduct "cyber war" on the scale of the China, Russia, and the US.

I completely agree that they should not be ignored.

Re: US and Israel created Stuxnet, lost control of it

#255

Post by duaneb »

tsotha wrote: post #200
duaneb wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With politicians involved, this kind of article (i.e. a reputable leak) is more dependable.

Reporters make up unnamed government officials all the time. While I agree the scenario they're painting isn't difficult to believe, calling it "confirmed" is going too far.

I agree, but it's more of a confirmation than whatever might come out of a politician's mouth in public.

Re: US and Israel created Stuxnet, lost control of it

#256

Post by espeed »

strags wrote: post #170

"[Obama] repeatedly expressed concerns that any American acknowledgment that it was using cyberweapons—even under the most careful and limited circumstances—could enable other countries, terrorists or hackers to justify their own attacks. “We discussed the irony, more than once,” one of his aides said." "Irony" is the wrong word. It's "hypocrisy".

It's what Chomsky calls "asserting the opposite," a psychological method to counter opposition. Essentially if "you assert opposite, it eliminates mountains of evidence" toward your own actions.

Re: US and Israel created Stuxnet, lost control of it

#257

Post by Turing_Machine »

Cadsby wrote: post #205
berntb wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The parallel comment by salimmadjd has a point about Pakistan maybe being even worse than Iran, when it comes to terror support (I do doubt that Saudi A as a country is worse). I might stand corrected, there. >>Every powerful country kills the civilians/citizens of other countries To explicitly target civilians is serious because it breaks the laws of war, etc. Democracies generally don't do that.

You are leaving out a rather glaring example. Neither atomic bomb, dropped by the one and only country ever to use them, were dropped on military targets. The "Democracies" of the world kill many innocent civilians, an order of magnitude in fact than any terrorist related event if you really want to compare the two. Not because the people running them are cartoonishly evil or anything, it simply reflects the massive…

"I doubt it makes a difference to the populations affected whether they were an intentional target, or the gps on the smart bomb that just leveled your house glitched out."

You're wrong.

If an airliner (or even a weapon) goes astray and kills my family, I am going to be angry, no doubt about it.

If you've deliberately targeted my family, my anger is going to be greater by several orders of magnitude.

For example, this case that was in the news today:

http://www.startribune.com/lifestyle/156366185.html

Suppose the phosphorous did get there through some type of negligence on one of the nearby bases (seems plausible, at least).

Are the woman and her family going to be angry? You bet. Are they going to file a monster lawsuit? Almost certainly. Are they going to declare war on the United States, or (try to) kill a few Marines? Not a chance in hell.

Intent matters.

Re: US and Israel created Stuxnet, lost control of it

#258

Post by Turing_Machine »

Cadsby wrote: post #246
berntb wrote: post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wrote: To explicitly target civilians is serious because it breaks the laws of war Got the answer: "kill many innocent civilians" Sigh, it is illegal to target . In a war, civilians will die. My point was that some sides do try to avoid civilan casualities. You didn't argue against my point, you made a spin. Then, someone isn't morally right by being weaker, so different strength have nothing to do with it. The nuc…

> Sigh, it is illegal to target. In a war, civilians will die. My point was that some sides do try to avoid civilan casualities. You didn't argue against my point, you made a spin. You place a lot of emphasis on intentionality. While it's an aspect worth considering, I don't find it as nearly as persuasive as you seem to. Many military actions are undertaken knowing full well the result with be civilian causalities,…

"You place a lot of emphasis on intentionality. While it's an aspect worth considering, I don't find it as nearly as persuasive as you seem to."

You are in a very small minority there. Sorry.

Re: US and Israel created Stuxnet, lost control of it

#259

Post by Turing_Machine »

freshhawk wrote: post #181
berntb wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The parallel comment by salimmadjd has a point about Pakistan maybe being even worse than Iran, when it comes to terror support (I do doubt that Saudi A as a country is worse). I might stand corrected, there. >>Every powerful country kills the civilians/citizens of other countries To explicitly target civilians is serious because it breaks the laws of war, etc. Democracies generally don't do that.

> To explicitly target civilians is serious because it breaks the laws of war, etc. Democracies generally don't do that. Democracies generally try not to publicize doing that. Unless it's done with drones apparently, then you brag about it.

Link to a democracy bragging about intentionally targeting a civilian?

Re: US and Israel created Stuxnet, lost control of it

#260

Post by Cadsby »

Turing_Machine wrote: post #258
Cadsby wrote: post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Sigh, it is illegal to target. In a war, civilians will die. My point was that some sides do try to avoid civilan casualities. You didn't argue against my point, you made a spin. You place a lot of emphasis on intentionality. While it's an aspect worth considering, I don't find it as nearly as persuasive as you seem to. Many military actions are undertaken knowing full well the result with be civilian causalities,…

"You place a lot of emphasis on intentionality. While it's an aspect worth considering, I don't find it as nearly as persuasive as you seem to." You are in a very small minority there. Sorry.

> You are in a very small minority there. Sorry.

I'm fine with that.

One last point worth considering - exactly what is the evidence that it is unintentional? None as far as I can tell other our leaders assert it constantly. And then turn around and do it again, repeatedly. To be clear, I don't think likely almost ever is. There's simply no advantage to it, especially in the modern information age. It's willful disregard in my opinion, which is debatably marginally better, but only marginally.

And the reason I focus on the actions of my society, the US, boils down to partly because it's my home, and there's no where you care more about than your own home. As much as I condemn the actions of Iran, or any other state, there's zero I can do about it. I'm not Iranian. I can, however, affect change here, again in the most powerful state, where it matters most. And the most fundamental principle of any moral framework is that you hold yourself to the same standards you seek to apply to others. More stringent ones, in fact, if you're serious about it.

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