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NUKEWARS
Iran denies nuclear plant computers among 30,000 hit by worm
by Staff Writers
Tehran (AFP) Sept 26, 2010


US does not know source, purpose of Stuxnet worm: official
Arlington, Virginia (AFP) Sept 24, 2010 - The United States is analyzing the "Stuxnet" computer worm but does not know who is behind it or its purpose, a top US cybersecurity official said Friday. "One of our hardest jobs is attribution and intent," Sean McGurk, director of the National Cybersecurity and Communications Integration Center (NCCIC), told reporters. "We've conducted analysis on the software itself," McGurk said during a tour of the Department of Homeland Security facility outside Washington which is responsible for coordinating government cybersecurity operations. "It's very difficult to say 'This is what it was targeted to do,'" he said of Stuxnet, which some computer security experts have said may be intended to sabotage a nuclear facility in Iran.

The worm has been found lurking on Siemens systems in India, Indonesia, Pakistan and elsewhere, but the heaviest infiltration appears to be in Iran, according to software security researchers. McGurk said Stuxnet had been found not only in power facilities but water purification or chemical plants which use the particular Siemens system it targets. "We haven't seen any impacts or effects of what it does," he said. "We know that it's not doing anything specifically malicious right now." McGurk said he could not say who is behind the worm. "It would be premature to speculate at this time," he said. "We're not looking for where it came from but trying to prevent the spread," he said, adding that Siemens is "reaching out to their customer base" to deal with the infection.

Bombers of Iran military parade killed: commander
Tehran (AFP) Sept 26, 2010 - The "main elements" behind the bombing at a military parade in Iran which killed 12 people were themselves killed by the elite Revolutionary Guards on Saturday, a senior commander said on Sunday. Mohammad Pakpour, head of the Guards' ground forces, also accused Israel and the United States of supporting Wednesday's attack in the ethnically Kurdish northwestern town of Mahabad in West Ajarbaijan province, ILNA news agency reported. "Upon the arrival of terrorists at the location of a meeting with other counter-revolutionaries in a border area, the siege and confrontation operation was put in motion," Pakpour was quoted as saying. "Several mercenaries and agents of global arrogance, including the main elements behind the terrorist crime at Mahabad, were killed," he said.

Pakpour did not elaborate on the location of the operation or the number of casualties. Wednesday's bombing targeted a military parade in Mahabad, killing 12 people and wounding at least 81 others. Most of the victims were reported to be women and children. The attack came as Iran showcased military hardware at anniversary parades across the country commemorating the 1980-88 war with Iraq, in which an estimated one million people died on both sides. US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton condemned the Mahabad attack, saying it "underscores the international community's need to work together to combat terrorism."

But Pakpour said Iran believed the United States and Israel were behind the bombing. "Investigations indicate the driving engine behind the Mahabad terrorist attack was the Zionist regime's spy agency (Mossad), with the cooperation of the Americans as well as some elements of the Baath party in Iraq," he was quoted as saying without providing further details. He did not make any reference to suspected involvement by any regional groups. Western Iran, which has a sizeable Kurdish population, has seen deadly clashes in recent years between the Iranian security forces and Kurdish rebel groups, mainly the Party of Free Life of Kurdistan (PJAK) operating from bases in neighbouring Iraq.

The malicious Stuxnet computer worm has hit 30,000 industrial computers in Iran, officials said on Sunday, but denied the Islamic republic's first nuclear plant at Bushehr was among those infected.

So far, Stuxnet has infected about 30,000 IP addresses in Iran, Mahmoud Liayi, head of the information technology council at the ministry of industries, was quoted as saying by the government-run newspaper Iran Daily.

Stuxnet, which was publicly identified in June, was tailored for Siemens supervisory control and data acquisition, or SCADA, systems commonly used to manage water supplies, oil rigs, power plants and other industrial facilities.

The worm is able to recognise a specific facility's control network and then destroy it, according to German computer security researcher Ralph Langner, who has been analysing the malicious software.

Langner said he suspected Stuxnet was targetting Bushehr nuclear power plant, where unspecified problems have been blamed for delays in getting the facility fully operational.

Siemens said its software has not been installed at the plant, and an Iranian official denied the malware may have infected nuclear facilities.

"This virus has not caused any damage to the main systems of the Bushehr power plant," Bushehr project manager Mahmoud Jafari said on Iran's Arabic-language Al-Alam television network.

"All computer programmes in the plant are working normally and have not crashed due to Stuxnet," said Jafari, adding there was no problem with the plant's fuel supply.

The official IRNA news agency meanwhile quoted him as saying the worm had infected some "personal computers of the plant's personnel."

And he told Fars news agency that so far, five versions of the malware had been detected in Iran.

Echoing Jafari's denial, the deputy head of Iran's Atomic Energy Organisation in charge of safety and security, Asghar Zarean, said neither the plant nor the organisation's computers were affected.

"Due to the precautions we have already employed for our systems, in our investigations we have not come across any penetration by the virus into our systems," Zarean was quoted as saying by IRNA.

The self-replicating worm has been found lurking on Siemens systems mostly in India, Indonesia and Pakistan, but the heaviest infiltration appears to be in Iran, according to researchers.

Telecommunications minister Reza Taqipour said "the worm has not been able to penetrate or cause serious damage to government systems."

According to Iran Daily, telecoms official Saeed Mahdiyoun said "teams of experts had begun to systematically eliminate the virus."

Meanwhile Liayi said given its complexity, Stuxnet was "likely a (foreign) government project," without giving details.

The newspaper cited various experts who suggested the United States and Israel were behind the malware, evoking the "West's electronic warfare against Iran."

Liayi said industries were currently receiving systems to combat Stuxnet, while stressing Iran had decided not to use anti-virus software developed by Siemens because "they could be carrying a new version of the malware."

"When Stuxnet is activated, the industrial automation systems start transmitting data about production lines to a main designated destination by the virus," Liayi said.

"There, the data is processed by the worm's architects and then engineer plots to attack the country."

Iran's nuclear ambitions are at the heart of a conflict between Tehran and the West, which suspects the Islamic republic is seeking to develop atomic weapons under the cover of a civilian drive.

Tehran denies the allegation and has pressed on with its enrichment programme -- the most controversial aspect of its nuclear activities -- despite four sets of UN Security Council sanctions.

earlier related report
Iran open to new nuclear talks: Ahmadinejad
New York (AFP) Sept 24, 2010 - Iran and the United States Friday both said they were open to a new round of nuclear talks, but their fierce enmity was again revealed by a war of words over the September 11 attacks.

US President Barack Obama and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad were both in the spotlight, though they never met, at the UN General Assembly meetings, on a day of dueling rhetoric and diplomatic jockeying for position.

Ahmadinejad said an Iranian official may meet European Union foreign affairs chief Catherine Ashton next month in a bid to open new international talks on a program which the West says is a quest for nuclear weapons.

He said some of the six powers negotiating on the nuclear dispute -- Britain, China, France, Germany, Russia and the United States -- had had contacts with Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki at the UN this week.

Ahmadinejad inisted it was up to Ashton to initiative moves for what he said was a meeting in October scheduled under a longstanding plan.

"If Ms Ashton contacts the Iranian representative she can set a time for talks," the Iranian leader told a press conference.

Denis McDonough, chief of staff of Obama's National Security, noted that Ashton reached out to Iran earlier this year, but never heard back.

"When she hears back, we will know whether they are serious or not," he said.

A day after telling Iran that the door for diplomacy was still open, Obama told the BBC Persian service that a genuine dialogue could see tough new sanctions on Iran removed, along with the fear of armed confrontation.

"Our strong preference is to resolve these issues diplomatically. I think that's in Iran's interest. I think that is in the interest of the international community," Obama said.

"I think it remains possible, but it is going to require a change in mindset inside the Iranian government."

Obama targeted Ahmadinejad over his tirade to the UN Security Council on Thursday, in which he suggested the US government staged the September 11 attacks in 2001.

"It was offensive, it was hateful," Obama said, slamming Ahmadinejad's remarks, and bemoaning the fact the outburst occurred in Manhattan, so close to the Ground Zero footprint of the felled World Trade Center twin towers.

About 3,000 people died in the attacks by Al-Qaeda operatives who hijacked passenger jets and flew them into the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon in Washington. A fourth plane crashed in Pennsylvania.

Ahmadinejad said in his speech that there was a theory that "some segments within the US government orchestrated the attack."

"The majority of the American people as well as other nations and politicians agree with this view," he declared to the astonished chamber prompting the US and other Western delegations to leave the assembly hall.

Ahmadinejad showed no desire to quell the controversy on Friday, calling for a UN probe into the "true reason" for the strikes, which he said led to US military actions that killed thousands in Iraq and Afghanistan.

In another development, freed US hiker Sarah Shourd said she met Ahmadinejad in New York to plead for the release of her finance and a friend still jailed in Iran.

Shourd, 32, was released last week after being detained in July 2009 in Iran, but had to leave behind her fiance Shane Bauer and friend Josh Fattal.

The hikers say they strayed by accident into Iran in July 2009 while hiking in the mountains in Iraqi Kurdistan. But Iranian authorities have alleged that they were spying.

Despite painstaking diplomacy, Iran has so far refused to accept an EU and US package of engagement and incentives to halt what the West says is a drive for nuclear weapons -- a charge Tehran denies.

US officials said here that they believe that the tough new range of sanctions imposed on Iran four months ago is beginning to bite, and has exacted a deeper toll on the economy than the government expected.

However, Obama admitted in his BBC interview that there were "no guarantees" the sanctions would force Iran to change its behavior, though expressed hopes they would cause deep reflection among Iranian leaders.

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