Stuxnet Virus Now Biggest Threat To Industry

digitaldc writes "A malicious computer attack that appears to target Iran's nuclear plants can be modified to wreak havoc on industrial control systems around the world, and represents the most dire cyberthreat known to industry, government officials and experts said Wednesday. They warned that industries are becoming increasingly vulnerable to the so-called Stuxnet worm as they merge networks and computer systems to increase efficiency. The growing danger, said lawmakers, makes it imperative that Congress move on legislation that would expand government controls and set requirements to make systems safer."

Idea

[Haedrian]

They should run Mac software on PLCs. Macs don't get viruses!

</satire>

A Ha

[Anonymous Coward]

"The growing danger, said lawmakers, makes it imperative that Congress move on legislation that would expand government controls and set requirements to make systems safer."

The mystery of the who and the why of stuxnet is now over.

Re:We should thank Israel, or whoever

[elrous0]

Yes, according to Captain Hindsight [wikia.com], we should have secured our PLC's and SCADA infrastructure better years ago.

Re:Idea

[elrous0]

They also make you morally superior to and smarter than anyone using a Windows machine. It's common knowledge in any coffee shop or arthouse theater.

Re:The solution

[L4t3r4lu5]

More importantly, don't use control software from companies who mandate that passwords are hard-coded and cannot be changed.

MS: "By the way, the Windows Server 2008 Domain Admin password is 12345. Be sure to write that down!"

IT Industry: "Lolwut? GTFO."
Nuclear Fuel Refinement Industry: "The same as my luggage! I like it!"

Re:We should thank Israel, or whoever

[elrous0]

Those bender units are notoriously unreliable and surly.

Re:We should thank Israel, or whoever

[Lumpy]

Because the customer is too stupid to use a different OS for the single application that needs to run on that?

If you think that you need to run Office on the SCADA computer, please throw yourself from the nearest building as people who think the way you do are the cause of this problem.

"Hey dave, the nuclear reactor computer, you think it will run Netflix?" Yup: you're the problem.