Reuters: Technology News: U.N. to warn member nations on risk of Flame virus

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U.N. to warn member nations on risk of Flame virus May 29th 2012, 16:51 Tweet Share this Email Print Related News Iran, big powers agree to hold more nuclear talks in June Thu, May 24 2012 IAEA chief says close to deal with Iran Tue, May 22 2012 Exclusive: Iran flouts U.N. sanctions, sends arms to Syria: panel Wed, May 16 2012 Analysis & Opinion Now is the time to not only maintain pressure on Iran, but increase it Saudis wouldn't gain much from a union with Bahrain Related Topics Tech » United Nations » A computer engineer checks equipment at an internet service provider in Tehran February 15, 2011. Credit: Reuters/Caren Firouz By Jim Finkle Tue May 29, 2012 12:51pm EDT (Reuters) - A United Nations agency charged with helping member nations secure their national infrastructures plans to issue a sharp warning about the risk of the Flame virus that was recently discovered in Iran and other parts of the Middle East. "This is the most serious (cyber) warning we have ever put out," said Marco Obiso, cyber security coordinator for the U.N.'s Geneva-based International Telecommunications Union. The confidential warning will tell member nations that the Flame virus is a dangerous espionage tool that could potentially be used to attack critical infrastructure, he said in an interview. "They should be on alert," he said. Evidence suggest that the virus, dubbed Flame, may have been built on behalf of the same nation or nations that commissioned the Stuxnet worm that attacked Iran's nuclear program in 2010, according to Kaspersky Lab, the Russian cyber security software maker that took credit for discovering the infections. "I think it is a much more serious threat than Stuxnet," Obiso said. He said the ITU would set up a program to collect data, including virus samples, to track Flame's spread around the globe and observe any changes in its composition. Kaspersky Lab said it found the Flame infection after the ITU asked the Russian company to investigate recent reports from Tehran that a mysterious virus was responsible for massive data losses on some Iranian computer systems. So far, the Kaspersky Lab team has not turned up the original data-wiping virus that they were seeking and the Iranian government has not provided Kaspersky a sample of that software, Obiso said. (Editing by Eric Walsh) Related Quotes and News Company Price Related News Tweet this Link this Share this Digg this Email Reprints We welcome comments that advance the story through relevant opinion, anecdotes, links and data. If you see a comment that you believe is irrelevant or inappropriate, you can flag it to our editors by using the report abuse links. Views expressed in the comments do not represent those of Reuters. For more information on our comment policy, see http://blogs.reuters.com/fulldisclosure/2010/09/27/toward-a-more-thoughtful-conversation-on-stories/ Comments (0) Be the first to comment on reuters.com. Add yours using the box above.

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