The Stuxnet Attack On Iran’s Nuclear Plant Was ‘Far More Dangerous’ Than Previously Thought

The Stuxnet virus that ravaged Iran’s Natanz nuclear facility “was far more dangerous than the cyberweapon that is now lodged in the public’s imagination,” cyber security expert Ralph Langer writes in Foreign Policy.

Stuxnet, a joint U.S.-Israel project, is known for reportedly destroying roughly a fifth of Iran’s nuclear centrifuges by causing them to spin out of control.

But the exploit had a previous element that was much more complicated and ”changed global military strategy in the 21st century,” according to Langer.

The lesser-known initial attack was designed to secretly “draw the equivalent of an electrical blueprint of the Natanz plant” to understand how the computers control the centrifuges used to enrich uranium, Peter Sanger of The New York Times reported last June.

Langer adds that the worm — which was delivered into Natanz through a worker’s thumb drive — also subtly increased the pressure on spinning centrifuges while showing the control room that everything appeared normal by replaying recordings of the plant’s protection system values while the attack occurred.

The intended effect was not destroying centrifuges, but “reducing lifetime of Iran’s centrifuges and making the Iranians’ fancy control systems appear beyond their understanding,” Langer writes. TRUNews