Monday, November 29, 2010

Iran admits 'software' interference

Iran's president has said some of the centrifuges used in its uranium enrichment programme were sabotaged, raising suspicions that they were targeted by the Stuxnet computer worm.

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said the problems had been created by enemies of Iran, but had had only a limited effect.

Iran has repeatedly denied that Stuxnet had affected its nuclear programme.

The UN said last week that Iran had temporarily halted most of its uranium enrichment work earlier this month.

The West fears Iran's ultimate goal is to build nuclear weapons. Iran says its programme is aimed solely at peaceful energy use.

"They succeeded in creating problems for a limited number of our centrifuges with the software they had installed in electronic parts," Mr Ahmadinejad told a news conference.

"Our specialists stopped that and they will not be able to do it again," he added without elaborating on the software thought to have been used.

The Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency said in a report last week that a temporary stoppage had hit Iran's Natanz enrichment nuclear plant earlier this month.

Experts say the worm, which Iran said in September had attacked its computers, has been specially configured to damage motors commonly used in uranium-enrichment centrifuges by sending them spinning out of control.

The computer bug is a form of customised malware, written to attack a precise target.

Analysts say the complexity of the code suggests it was created by a "nation state" in the West, rather than an organised crime group.

Senior Iranian officials have said that the virus is evidence that an "electronic war" has been launched against the country.

Mr Ahmadinejad's comments about the cyber attack worm come on the day that a high-profile Iranian nuclear scientist was killed and another wounded in two separate but similar attacks in the capital.

The president accused Israel and the West of being behind the attacks.



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US shuts down file-sharing sites

More than 70 sites alleged to be selling counterfeit goods or offering pirated content have been shut down by the US government.

The action was taken by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, part of the US Department of Homeland Security.

Domains seized included a BitTorrent search engine, music download sites and shops selling fake designer clothing.

Many of the sites who lost their domains have continued trading via alternative addresses.

ICE confirmed that it had taken the action to the New York Times but said it could not provide any details because the seizures were part of an "ongoing investigation".

Anyone trying to visit the seized pages was confronted by a screen saying that the domain had been taken over by ICE and which quoted US laws on copyright infringement and trafficking in counterfeit goods.

Domains seized included louis-vuitton-outlet-store.com, burberryoutletshop.com, rapgodfathers.com, mydreamwatches.com as well as BitTorrent search engine Torrent-Finder.com.

ICE's action involved gaining control of the domain name that sites were trading under. It did not involve removing any content from the sites affected or blocking the use of an IP address.

Many of the sites that lost their domains have moved to new names in a bid to keep running.

The seizures follows similar action earlier in 2010 against nine sites also believed to be involved in counterfeiting and pirating copyrighted material.

The action comes as the UK's Serious and Organised Crime Agency seeks similar powers over .uk domains it deems are involved in criminal activity.



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