Drone operators at Holloman Air Force Base in the southwestern state of New Mexico: Modern warfare is as invisible as a thought, deprived of its meaning by distance. Gilles Mingasson/ DER SPIEGEL
Wired: Exclusive: Computer Virus Hits U.S. Drone Fleet
A computer virus has infected the cockpits of America's Predator and Reaper drones, logging pilots' every keystroke as they remotely fly missions over Afghanistan and other warzones.
The virus, first detected nearly two weeks ago by the military's Host-Based Security System, has not prevented pilots at Creech Air Force Base in Nevada from flying their missions overseas. Nor have there been any confirmed incidents of classified information being lost or sent to an outside source. But the virus has resisted multiple efforts to remove it from Creech's computers, network security specialists say. And the infection underscores the ongoing security risks in what has become the U.S. military's most important weapons system.
"We keep wiping it off, and it keeps coming back," says a source familiar with the network infection, one of three that told Danger Room about the virus. "We think it's benign. But we just don't know."
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Upate: US military drone fleet infected by computer virus that 'keeps coming back' (IBTimes)
WNU Editor: A cyber attack? Either way it shows how behind the times the U.S. is when it comes network security issues.
2 comments:
WNU, please. You should know better, given your background in IT.
Nothing, and I mean nothing, is unhackable or immune to a cyber attack. Every day we have evidence to this. You know this.
It doesn't necessarily show "how behind the US" is.. it shows a) that the US is a target, b) that it succeeds rarely / is reported rarely.
Given how big (in terms of network size) and prevalent (in terms of attaction) the US military is as a target, I think they are doing a decent job. Of course it can always be improved, but "how behind the times" is barely a worthy analysis by you this time :P
P.S. just as a bit of added information: I used to hack all kind of servers (usually IIS, because it was so easy) back in my days, and the US military FTP servers (whole IP ranges we knew to target) were easy to get and adequate for my/our purposes. Average time to hack and convert was about an hour per target. This has changed. I haven't done it in a while but I can guarantee you it's not that easy for script kiddies / amateur hackers like me to get in like that anymore. Back in the good old days it also took them ages to notice any changes, sometimes my converted servers stayed undetected for my purposes for several weeks. And that was when bandwith/data transferred were expensive. But yeah if anyone of the military reads this, I was young (14-17), so I hope no one gets mad :)
So, all in all -- yes, they got hacked, but I assure you (and I think you know) any target can be hacked, it usually just requires some skill, patience and most importantly time. (that's why you also see hackers being young often - at least for me that was the case.. I skipped high school very often and then had time to hack.. people who have to go to the office and work, rarely hack ;)
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