Zero Days

7/19/2016

Stuxnet was malware that flashed around the world via Microsoft computers, triggering arbitrary BSODs and random reboots. In 2010 cybersecurity firms captured and began analyzing the worm. Stuxnet (name derived from merging two random lines in the code) had digital certificates. Digital certificates require biometrics (human identification) and pass codes. But Stuxnet could attain access without that. It ominously coded multiple zero days exploit. Symantec's investigators see maybe one a year, looking at thousands of lines of code. Stuxnet had four. As we learn in the documentary, it also had undoubtedly stolen product identity codes for PLCs (programmable logic controls) from Siemens. Where were these PLCs? Installed on centrifuges at Natanz, an Iranian nuclear site. And the game's afoot.