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Computer virus hits US Predator and Reaper drone fleet

arstechnica.com

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Re: Computer virus hits US Predator and Reaper drone fleet

#31

Post by EGreg »

Terrorism is primarily a problem of technology, imho. As things become more automated, they have a capacity to be used for both intended and unintended purposes. If our military relies on drones, it should make sure they can't be used against us :)

But to illustrate my main point, 1000 years ago it was impossible for one man to destroy a lot of people. 500 years ago a man Guy Fawkes could use gunpowder to blow up part of a building. SInce then we invented dynamite, planes, rockets... a society in which technology enables a small group of people to wreak havoc on a large group of people must necessarily have more surveillance/intelligence than one where this is not possible, if it is to ensure the security of its citizens. I mean what is to prevent a person from releasing a contagious virus in the NYC subway or something similar, and the effects to show up only days later? I hate to say it but we don't know where we're going with all this technology's potential for bad things.

Re: Computer virus hits US Predator and Reaper drone fleet

#32

Post by pavpanchekha »

Perhaps the fact that our computer systems are now of military importance and the fact that a security hole can mean deaths and international relations disasters will finally lead to people taking a good look at verified computing. Where a virus doesn't mean outsmarting some forgetful C programmer but is mathematically impossible.

Or not, it was just a bug, we'll fix it this one time and pretend it will never happen again. Worse is better, as they say!

Re: Computer virus hits US Predator and Reaper drone fleet

#33

Post by jlarocco »

misterbwong wrote: post #18
rdl wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's funny. It's Windows. Very little Unix anywhere in the DoD over the past few years on new systems; it's mainly legacy, or embedded in products they purchase. There are definitely some Unix server deployments within DoD even now, but they're few and far between. Blue Screen of Death and all.

Wow can anyone confirm this? I'm surprised that the drones themselves are running windows. If so, I presume it's win CE or a custom variant of?

The way it works is some AF guy in Nevada remotely controls the drones flying half way across the world.

My guess is it's not the drones themselves running Windows, but the consoles used to communicate with the drones. It makes sense. AF guy gets to work, plugs in his USB drive filled with music and pulls up the drone control program...

Though, now that I think about it, I would be disappointed, but not entirely surprised, if the drones ran Windows also. Sigh.

Re: Computer virus hits US Predator and Reaper drone fleet

#34

Post by count »

civilian wrote: post #28

Okay! Here's what the sysadmins should be doing: Each GCS should be recording the identity & timestamp of each removable drive that is attached to it. Then we'll have a graph of all the connections between the machines. If any GCSes aren't infected (or if we have any information about which machines first showed evidence of the virus) then we might be able to trace out the path of infection. Hopefully it'll lead to p…

They have tools available for them to do that today. In fact, that's one of the driving forces behind HBSS deployment.

Re: Computer virus hits US Predator and Reaper drone fleet

#35

Post by roc »

Pyrodogg wrote: post #13
hugh3 wrote: post #6

It seems to me that a more interesting question than "how did the malware get there?" is "why are they telling us that they found it?" Presumably the default thing to do under these circumstances would be to shut up about it, so the fact that they're broadcasting it to the whole world must mean something. In any case I wouldn't take any of the details at face value -- e.g. do they really not have any idea where it ca…

Because someone leaked it. > “We keep wiping it off, and it keeps coming back,” says a source familiar with the network infection, one of three that told Danger Room about the virus. “We think it’s benign. But we just don’t know.” The end of the article says they asked for an official response and were stonewalled. > The Air Force declined to comment directly on the virus. “We generally do not discuss specific vulner…

Or the military staff is leaking this to motivate the higher-up who green-lit the contract to exert some pressure, because they have unfortunately-little direct power themselves.

Re: Computer virus hits US Predator and Reaper drone fleet

#37

Post by phillmv »

JonnieCache wrote: post #26
rdl wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are hundreds of thousands of machines and millions of removable drives. Tracking down every last instance of a piece of malware and then dealing with it is quite hard at that scale. Usually they fall back on policy ("no usb/removable drives") They're handicapped by a need AND compulsion to use contractors for everything. Actual government employees didn't build drones; they were all developed and in many cases…

If I'm ever in charge of a PC capable of firing guns at people, then at a bare minimum I would disable the USB bus entirely, I probably wouldn't fit a NIC either. I'd also definitely install some of that software that makes the HDD read only and transparently passes through all writes to RAM. Fuckit, if I'm the US military I'd develop such a device in hardware. Send the recorded video/telemetry data to a write-only v…

>It's not that hard.

eye roll

Re: Computer virus hits US Predator and Reaper drone fleet

#38

Post by count »

eli wrote: post #30
ck2 wrote: post #4

Oh please tell me they aren't running windows. Just wait until the cops start using these in the USA for "crowd control" ugh.

It's almost certainly Windows. What would you expect a DoD desktop computer to be running?

As you can see in the picture of the Predator cockpit so helpfully provided, it is definitely windows.

Re: Computer virus hits US Predator and Reaper drone fleet

#39

Post by pohl »

bitstream wrote: post #24
ck2 wrote: post #4

Oh please tell me they aren't running windows. Just wait until the cops start using these in the USA for "crowd control" ugh.

I don't think the problem here is their OS, rather it'll be their network structure. So instead, perhaps that should be: "Oh please tell me they didn't connect directly to the internet".

That's the sort of thinking that leads to a crunchy shell with a soft, chewy center.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defense_in_depth_%28computing%2...

Re: Computer virus hits US Predator and Reaper drone fleet

#40

Post by munin »

JonnieCache wrote: post #26
rdl wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are hundreds of thousands of machines and millions of removable drives. Tracking down every last instance of a piece of malware and then dealing with it is quite hard at that scale. Usually they fall back on policy ("no usb/removable drives") They're handicapped by a need AND compulsion to use contractors for everything. Actual government employees didn't build drones; they were all developed and in many cases…

If I'm ever in charge of a PC capable of firing guns at people, then at a bare minimum I would disable the USB bus entirely, I probably wouldn't fit a NIC either. I'd also definitely install some of that software that makes the HDD read only and transparently passes through all writes to RAM. Fuckit, if I'm the US military I'd develop such a device in hardware. Send the recorded video/telemetry data to a write-only v…

then the general will tell you "y'know the boys tell me that their job would be easier if they could listen to pandora on this puppy. i order you to connect it to the internet. if you don't comply, i'll have you arrested."

have fun!

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