I think we can all agree that it has begun, but I wonder what people think of it?
Stuxnet was designed especially to halt progress in Iran's 'alleged' nuclear weapons program, the virus worked so well no one knew it was there until it copied itself off the target computers and was taken into the public sphere.
The same can be said for its follow on 'Flame' which is, I believe, said to be a new level of cunning and complexity for a computer virus.
If, as has been reported, these viruses came from a joint US-Isreli program to attack Iran then would it be fair to say that the US and Iran are at war? And if you wouldn't agree they are (at least not a full scale war) what rights do Iran have considering the US have taken the first agressive steps in this war. As far as I can see the only thing stopping the creation and uploading of these viruses being construed as an agressive act of war was that they are designed solely to stop the development of weapons (alas this also comes with stopping nuclear power, but I guess the US see that as a part of the same mission)
Does Iran has any right (if it can prove it) to prosecute the US (and/or Israel) for the computer attacks?
I think there have been reports of Chinese attacks on American companies (and possibly government installations) but as far as I can tell there is no come back from the US, just some politcal posturing.
Where will this lead us, will there be a covert world war going on, where governments attack other governments in an effort to destabilise them and keep them occupied on anything other than economical gain?
It is irresponsible of the US to create a new level of computer weaponry, considering that 'flame' has now made its way to Russia and been discovered, knowing that it will probably be reverse engineered and the new tactics that America pioneered (or new programming cunning that probably took highly intelligent teams of military grade programmers months or years to design) will find their way into the commerical (black market) side of computer viruses, so that we the public will have to face greater threats to our computers?
***Please note this message contains a virus and that I (Moonbat's evil twin - Sunfish) have taken control of your computer and will be using it to slowly heat the world and cause a rise in sea levels.
EVIL LAUGH