From AFP:  US cyber war against Iran’s nuclear program may have only just begun and could escalate with explosions triggered by digital sabotage, experts say.  Although the Iranian regime remains vulnerable to more cyber attacks in the aftermath of the "Stuxnet" worm that disrupted its uranium enrichment work, Tehran may be receiving help from Russian proxies for its digital security, some analysts say.

The nuclear program is "really not that well protected" from more digital assaults and Iran will be hard-pressed to safeguard its uranium enrichment efforts from tainted software, said David Albright, president of the Institute for Science and International Security.

"With Stuxnet, they lost about a year. And it caused a lot of confusion. They really didn’t know what hit them," he said. "It looks like a viable way to disrupt their program."

The United States, which reportedly masterminded the Stuxnet operation along with Israel, has every incentive to press ahead with a cyber campaign to undermine Iran’s atomic ambitions, according to analysts.

The next cyber attack, possibly in combination with more traditional spycraft, could shut off valves or issue incorrect orders that might cause an explosion at a sensitive site.

"I think that it could get more violent," Albright told AFP. "I would expect more facilities to blow up."

A major explosion at a missile plant in Iran in November sparked speculation that the incident was the result of sabotage. . . .

[S]ome cyber security experts suspect Russian proxies could be assisting Iran with its digital defenses, and possibly helped Tehran trace the origins of Stuxnet.

"The part that we probably miscalculated on in Stuxnet was the (possible) assistance of the Russians in attribution," said James Lewis, senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

"The Iranians never would have figured this out on their own," said Lewis, a former senior government official with the Departments of State and Commerce.  (graphic: PressTV/Iran)  (via @JarnoLim)

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