Massive Cyber Attack in Middle East Believed to Be State Sponsored

A new computer virus, named "Flame," is being called possibly the most massive cyber attack in history—targeting primarily Iran, it seems, although the following RT report mentions attacks upon Israel, as well.



Unlike the RT report, a report in the New York Times does not say anything about the virus effecting computers in Israel. In fact, the article seems to hint very strongly (perhaps with a touch of pride?) that the Flame virus was created by Israel. Here is an excerpt:

The virus bears special encryption hallmarks that an Iranian cyberdefense official said bear strong similarities to previous Israeli malware. “Its encryption has a special pattern which you only see coming from Israel,” said Kamran Napelian, an official with Iran’s Computer Emergency Response Team. “Unfortunately, they are very powerful in the field of I.T.”

While Israel never comments officially on such matters, its involvement was hinted at by top officials there. “Anyone who sees the Iranian threat as a significant threat — it’s reasonable that he will take various steps, including these, to harm it,” said the vice prime minister and strategic affairs minister, Moshe Yaalon, in a widely quoted interview with Israel’s Army Radio on Tuesday.

Interestingly, both the Times article, as well as this story at Y-Net, are accompanied by photos of a segment of the virus code, apparently courtesy of Russia's Kaspersky Lab. And like RT, Y-Net also claims computers in Israel have been infected with the virus. There has of course been widespread speculation the Stuxnet virus was an Israeli creation, and even Wikipedia seems to give a great deal of credence to the theory. Stuxnet's possible role in the Fukushima disaster has also been explored. See here , here , and here.

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