Digital Warfare - Duqu: Struxnet family of BOTS

Stuxnet, the first military-grade cyberweapon known to the world.  Stuxnet was believed to have been released in late 2009 and millions of computers were infected as the worm though there are other references which claim that it was release as early as 2007. Stuxnet was designed to cripple control systems. The list of modules built as a part of Struxnet provide different kinds of permutations and combinations to reassemble the code with variations. One such example was the birth of Duqu.
Duqu, acts as a Trojan, stealing data, potentially acting in the planning stages of an attack. It can be said that DuQu was used as an intelligence gathering tool, possibly  aiming to prepare the ground for future attacks.  According to Alex Gostev, the main module consists of three components:

• a driver that injects a DLL into system processes;
• a DLL that has an additional module and works with the C&C; and
• a configuration file.

Digital Warfare & Struxnet - Where are we in security?

Enisa has come up with a statement that Stuxnet is a specialized malware targeting SCADA systems running Siemens SIMATIC® WinCC or SIMATIC® Siemens STEP 7 software for process visualization and system control.  The software consists of a series of software block, which are combined into a project.Some of the blocks include Function blocks, Operational blocks, and Data blocks. These software system command the components that control speed in gas-enrichment centrifuges, used for separating radioactive isotopes by spinning at supersonic speeds.

Cyber threat Stuxnet & Big data analysis

Cyber threat to national economy is an emerging menace. Countries world wide have started realizing this and have taken their stand. What was once a war on the land is getting shadowed as history.  The new sophisticated warfare has opted for cyber weapons as their gadgets. For example the same blog has mentioned about Federal Trojan and its capabilities. The Trojan was used to intercept skype transactions and other such online transactions. 

BigData & Digital footprint

Big-data is painting the data canvas with novel techniques and methods to handle new forms of business built on predictive intelligence. Going by the statement”Nothing is free in this world” organizations provide certain e-services to capitalize on the fact that  if a customer is not paying for service, then he is the product who can be used to leverage the existing business. Customers at large including free users have chiseled their digital footprints which were hitherto ignored. Thanks to the emergence of big data; the values of such digital footprints have been recognized. Going by the law of survival, when left in wild, there is a need to establish and track the digital footprints in order to profile the customer base. Big data analytic is emerging as a digital foot print tracker and modeler to provide the razor sharp strategic edge for organizations to leverage their existing business and cross pollinate.

Federal Trojan

Federal Trojan aka R2D2 is considered to be one of the SKYPE interceptors as understood from the register. This trojon is also called by other names "0zapftis" or "Bundestrojaner",This trojan has the capability of running on 32 bit systems; with support for 64 bit versions of Windows. The technology works via a local installation of malware on the clients computer. BOTs and Trojans are  classified generally under Malware.