IDG News Service - Siemens is warning customers of a new and highly
sophisticated virus that targets the computers used to manage large-scale
industrial control systems used by manufacturing and utility companies.

"This has all the hallmarks of weaponized software, probably for espionage,"
said Jake Brodsky, an IT worker with a large utility, who asked that his
company not be identified because he was not authorized to speak on its
behalf.

Other industrial systems security experts agreed, saying the malicious
software was written by a sophisticated and determined attacker. The
software does not exploit a bug in the Siemens system to get onto a PC, but
instead uses a previously undisclosed Windows bug to break into the system.

The virus targets Siemens management software called Simatic WinCC, which
runs on the Windows operating system

http://www.computerworld.com/s/artic...strial_secrets

Best Regards

Tom.



--- news://freenews.netfront.net/ - complaints: ---

Scary stuff, hopefully a virus does not get into my milling machine.
At least my mill does not run on Windows.

i

On 2010-07-20, azotic wrote:
IDG News Service - Siemens is warning customers of a new and highly
sophisticated virus that targets the computers used to manage large-scale
industrial control systems used by manufacturing and utility companies.

"This has all the hallmarks of weaponized software, probably for espionage,"
said Jake Brodsky, an IT worker with a large utility, who asked that his
company not be identified because he was not authorized to speak on its
behalf.

Other industrial systems security experts agreed, saying the malicious
software was written by a sophisticated and determined attacker. The
software does not exploit a bug in the Siemens system to get onto a PC, but
instead uses a previously undisclosed Windows bug to break into the system.

The virus targets Siemens management software called Simatic WinCC, which
runs on the Windows operating system

http://www.computerworld.com/s/artic...strial_secrets

Best Regards

Tom.



--- news://freenews.netfront.net/ - complaints: ---

Ignoramus23878 wrote:

Scary stuff, hopefully a virus does not get into my milling machine.
At least my mill does not run on Windows.

Windows or not, if your router / firewall doesn't map any ports to your
CNC control PC and you don't do any risky stuff on that PC like music
pirating, etc. you should have a very low risk of getting a virus on
your CNC control.

I've had many Windows PCs for years and have never had a virus on any of
them, including several that are online and on net 24x365. I always
wonder what dumb-ass stuff these people who constantly get viruses on
their PCs are doing.

"Pete C." fired this volley in news:4c45af39$0$5333
:

I always
wonder what dumb-ass stuff these people who constantly get viruses on
their PCs are doing.



I can't imagine, either, but I had one in the office here for about five
years.

We have the normal, irritating, and not-so-effective Norton on all
computers. We have a FireBox Edge, kept up to date.

Nobody ever got a bug over five years, except this one woman, who got one
about every week. Thank goodness she wasn't a member of the office
network, just had access to internet and email.

LLoyd

On 2010-07-20, Pete C. wrote:

Ignoramus23878 wrote:

Scary stuff, hopefully a virus does not get into my milling machine.
At least my mill does not run on Windows.

Windows or not, if your router / firewall doesn't map any ports to your
CNC control PC and you don't do any risky stuff on that PC like music
pirating, etc. you should have a very low risk of getting a virus on
your CNC control.

I do not do music pirating from my mill, this would be a bit much (and
the milling PC has very little memory). I do music pirating from my
basement desktop/server. From there, the music is shared with the rest
of the house (including the mill) via NFS.

I've had many Windows PCs for years and have never had a virus on any of
them, including several that are online and on net 24x365. I always
wonder what dumb-ass stuff these people who constantly get viruses on
their PCs are doing.

I think that they visit websites.

i

Ignoramus23878 wrote:

On 2010-07-20, Pete C. wrote:

Ignoramus23878 wrote:

Scary stuff, hopefully a virus does not get into my milling machine.
At least my mill does not run on Windows.

Windows or not, if your router / firewall doesn't map any ports to your
CNC control PC and you don't do any risky stuff on that PC like music
pirating, etc. you should have a very low risk of getting a virus on
your CNC control.

I do not do music pirating from my mill, this would be a bit much (and
the milling PC has very little memory). I do music pirating from my
basement desktop/server. From there, the music is shared with the rest
of the house (including the mill) via NFS.

I don't pirate music at all. I'm not particularly music oriented, and
these days you can legitimately buy the individual tracks you may want
for $1 which is fine with me.


I've had many Windows PCs for years and have never had a virus on any of
them, including several that are online and on net 24x365. I always
wonder what dumb-ass stuff these people who constantly get viruses on
their PCs are doing.

I think that they visit websites.

The funny thing is that I visit plenty of websites as well and still
never get any viruses. Either they are visiting some really strange
websites, or their primary infection route is from stupidly opening SPAM
emails.

Pete C. wrote:
Ignoramus23878 wrote:
Scary stuff, hopefully a virus does not get into my milling machine.
At least my mill does not run on Windows.

Windows or not, if your router / firewall doesn't map any ports to your
CNC control PC and you don't do any risky stuff on that PC like music
pirating, etc. you should have a very low risk of getting a virus on
your CNC control.

I've had many Windows PCs for years and have never had a virus on any of
them, including several that are online and on net 24x365. I always
wonder what dumb-ass stuff these people who constantly get viruses on
their PCs are doing.
They run games they download on the web. I know, my kids do all that
stuff, and their PC slowly ground to a halt, with about 7 custom
toolbars loaded on Firefox.

I finally put my foot down and installed Linux on their computer, and
have had much less trouble.

Jon

On Tue, 20 Jul 2010 01:13:32 -0700, azotic wrote:

The virus targets Siemens management software called Simatic WinCC, which
runs on the Windows operating system

http://www.computerworld.com/s/artic...strial_secrets

Hell, Windows _itself_ is a virus! ;-)

Cheers!
Rich

Rich Grise wrote:

On Tue, 20 Jul 2010 01:13:32 -0700, azotic wrote:

The virus targets Siemens management software called Simatic WinCC, which
runs on the Windows operating system

http://www.computerworld.com/s/artic...strial_secrets

Hell, Windows _itself_ is a virus! ;-)


Only for those who are truly too stupid to own a computer.


I spent most of the past week teaching video editing on a computer.
A brand new eight core 3 GHz Windows 7 system with 8 GB of RAM and a 1
TB hard drive. It assembled the final cut of an 18:30 minute video in
just over two minutes, using AVS4You. I didn't like the trackball they
had, so they bought a 'Griffin Powermate' from Griffin for $45,
including shipping.


http://www.griffintechnology.com/products/powermate


It replaces the usual video edit 'jog wheel', but is programmable to
emulate up to six keyboard commands. I set it to move the video about
half a second per rotation to find the edit points. It was almost as
nice as the professional 1" VTR editing system I last used, at more than
$100,000 lower cost. It consisted of three 1" R-R Sony VTRs with
digital TBCs, one Umatic recorder, four custom interface boxes and the
edit controller. That filled most of three 6' relay racks.

That video will be used at trade shows for the next five weeks,
before the next project. It will be shown on a Vista based laptop, in
MP4 format.

It took less than a half hour from the time the computer's box was
opened, till it was ready to edit video. How long would it take you to
find all the linux crap, compile a kernel and set up a system?

I also created the brochure they will be handing out. Part was done
with GIMP, the rest on the newest version of Paint. It was printed out
on a brand new HP CP2025n color laser printer with a built in duplexer.
It has both USB and ethernet interfaces built in. It prints 21 pages a
minute in black or color.

http://www.shopping.hp.com/product/printer/laserjet/1/storefronts/CB494A%2523ABA

I've seen other computer based video editors that would have taken
days to render that edit. I'm happy that I never had to use one.

--
Anyone wanting to run for any political office in the US should have to
have a DD214, and a honorable discharge.