Stuxnet Worm May Have Targeted Iranian Reactor

yuna49 writes "Analysis of the Stuxnet worm suggests its target might have been Iran's nuclear program. "Last week Ralph Langner, a well-respected expert on industrial systems security, published an analysis of the Stuxnet worm, which targets Siemens software systems, and suggested that it may have been used to sabotage Iran's Bushehr nuclear reactor. A Siemens expert, Langner simulated a Siemens industrial network and then analyzed the worm's attack. Experts had first thought that Stuxnet was written to steal industrial secrets, but Langner found something quite different. The worm actually looks for very specific Siemens settings — a kind of fingerprint that tells it that it has been installed on a very specific Programmable Logic Controller (PLC) device — and then it injects its own code into that system."

Comments

Windows for Industrial/control use

[Danathar]

Maybe it's the developer tools available? The overall windows ecosystem availability?

Whatever it is, the IDEA of using windows for mission critical control systems is insane from a security perspective (along with other reasons). Given that windows was never designed for embedded use, is probably not updated for security patches with systems that are not networked (on a regular basis) and is the target of the worlds computer security issues it seems a no-brainer to stay AWAY from it. I suppose money had something to do with it and not actual real thought to the dangers of using windows for these systems.