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

by Kim Zetter

THE REVELATIONS BEGAN that April, when a virus began running wild on computers at the Iranian Oil Ministry and the Iranian National Oil Company, wiping out the hard drive of every system it touched. The damage was systematic and complete, destroying gigabytes of data at a time. First, the malware eliminated documents and data files, then it went after system files, zapping core parts of the hard drive to cause them to crash and burn.

Iranian officials dubbed it “Wiper”

There was no discernable pattern to the pool of victims—Flame targeted individuals, private companies, government agencies, and academic institutions. But it wasn’t difficult to see what types of files the attackers were after, since the malware contained a list of file extensions it sought, including Microsoft Word documents, PowerPoint presentations, and Excel files. But also high on the list were AutoCAD drawings, which had been targeted by Duqu as well. Flame, notably, was also looking to steal digital certificates.