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Subscribe to RSSDUBAI - Iran was investigating a suspected cyber attack on its main oil export terminal and on the Oil Ministry itself, Iranian industry sources said on Monday.
A virus was detected inside the control systems of Kharg Island, the country's largest crude oil export facility, but the terminal remained operational, a source at the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) told Reuters.
Officials said the attack had not corrupted vital information at NIOC, although it had damaged general information, an oil ministry official told the semi-official Fars news agency, which has some ties to the government.
"This cyber attack has not damaged the main data of the oil ministry and the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) since the general servers are separate from the main servers, even their cables are not linked to each other and are not linked to internet service," Alireza Nikzad told the agency.
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The virus, which is likely to be compared to the Stuxnet computer worm which reportedly affected Iranian nuclear facilities in 2009-10, struck late on Sunday, Reuters reported.
It hit the internet and communications systems of Iran's Oil Ministry and of its national oil company, the Mehr news agency -- which calls itself "private and non-official media"-- reported. Computer systems controlling a number of Iran's other oil facilities have been disconnected from the Internet as a precaution, the agency added.
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Hamdullah Mohammadnejad, the head of civil defense at the oil ministry, was reported as saying Iranian authorities had set up a crisis unit and were working out how to neutralize the attacks.
IT systems at the oil ministry and at the national oil company were also disconnected to prevent the spread of any virus, the Mehr news agency said.
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The oil ministry's own media network, Shana, quoted a spokesman as saying no major damage had been sustained.
Iran's nuclear program is thought to be the principal target of the Stuxnet worm -- discovered in 2010 -- the first virus believed to have been specifically designed to subvert industrial systems.
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U.S.-based think-tank, the Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS), said that in late 2009 or early 2010 about 1,000 centrifuges -- machines used to refine uranium - out of the 9,000 used at Iran's Natanz enrichment plant, had been knocked out by the virus -- not enough to seriously harm its operations.
Iran also identified damage inflicted by a similar virus aimed at disrupting industrial processes, called Duqu. Experts say Duqu appears to be designed to gather data to make it easier to launch future attacks and that very few organizations could have written such complex programs.
Most of the world's oil facilities are controlled by computers, but some processes can be controlled manually when necessary. A shipping source with knowledge of operations at Kharg Island said that NIOC has been prevented from sending out the crude loading program at the terminal.
Reuters contributed to this report.
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It is the age of cyber warfare. China has already launched it against the US. Not a surprise, if someone was willing to risk a nuclear reactor accident to hold off Iran's ability to get warheads, it was obvious more was to come.
If I were planning to attack another country, I would certainly like it if I was able to, pre-attack, shut down some of its major systems that would be utilized to counter any attack. But before doing so, I would probably want to test out my capability of doing so on some lesser systems(beta run). It is really too bad that Iran insists upon continuing its nuclear weapons program.
Of course, the downside to this is that others will be seeking to attack our computer based operations in retaliation or for other reasons, And we already have the FBI warning PC users that they may find themselves shut off in a few short months due to a dormant "virus" they can not control.
I wonder if that will be taking place at about the same time Iran faces the roll out of the all out attack? I also wonder if the age of computer based systems/communications may come to a screeching halt if cyber attacks are ratcheted up into full blown warfare.
No way to know. All the furor about cyber warfare is 98% percent speculation, 1% projection of civilian-sector hacking, and 1% actual, tested technology.
It might be a new era of warfare, where an army's success is more dependent on which side has the better tech support than tactics or weapons... or it could be nothing but over-hyped media fodder, promoted by "experts" because it sounds exciting and relevant.
It would be nice if we never had occasion to find out.
I'll bet that DRONE we sent them was rigged! What do you think?
Not so sure about that. But one can only hope it was. The lame part about the drone thing was Obama begging Iran to send it back. Made him (and US) look very weak. He should have listened to the Generals and sent in a couple of planes to destroy it before the Iranian's (Chinese and Russians) had a chance to study it. Could turn out to be a very costly mistake.
KingK...so we bomb Iran over a drone? Really? I can understand some people not giving a damn about Iranian, but what about the retaliation? Going to war over tech that will cost them a billion to copy and replicate is kind of dumb.
He is not talking about a nuclear bomb just a bomb to destroy the drone. With regards to a nuclear reactor malfunction that could happen regardless if the west causes it or not. Look at the meltdown in Japan.
I thought him asking for it back was pretty funny and ballsy, as a way to tell them "what's mine is mine" and FU.
Gee wonder where that virus was sent from...hmmmm
The Iranians are about to get a taste of wipass for their poor judgement.When its over they will be fortunate to have flashlights
The Iranians can live on flashlights and gas lamps. Hell, they even sent their children into Iraqi minefields to clear the way for the trained troops. Somehow, I think that they will have no problem taking out a bunch of our ships and killing thousands of our soldiers and sailors as well as major city in the US as payback.
Do you think we can handle the effects of war as easily as they can? If not, don't go picking a war with someone that is willing to tie a bomb to their kid's chest UNLESS you are willing to kill every last one of them. I don't think we have the heart to wipe an entire people out.
On the other side, a bad case of the flu breaking out in the Iranian Parliament's Mosque might not be a bad idea....
The Iranians must as dumb as a boot. This is good old fashion USA technology at work. Last week we took out the North Koreans rocket, and this week is Iranian oil. You mess with the bull, you get the horns!
Someone on Kharg Island was surfing the wrong porno sites...
The enrichment facilities only had 1/9 of the operation taken out? why couldnt all of them be taken out o.0. Also this "virus" needs to start sending a couple hundred barrels my way, my car like to drink gasoline.
Have these guys ever heard of McAfee?
It's those two faced F""" Bastards. The declining USA trying to keep head above water.....