Countdown to Zero Day: Stuxnet and the Launch of the World's First Digital Weapon

by Kim Zetter

Windows .LNK files are responsible for rendering the icons for the contents of a USB flash drive or other portable media device when it’s plugged into a PC. Insert a USB flash drive into a PC, and Windows Explorer or a similar tool automatically scans it for .LNK files to display the icon for a music file, Word document, or program stored on the flash drive.8 But in this case, the attackers embedded an exploit in a specially crafted .LNK file so that as soon as Windows Explorer scanned the file, it triggered the exploit to spring into action to surreptitiously deposit the USB’s malicious cargo onto the machine,