French fighter planes grounded by Windows computer virus

[bananas]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/france/4547649/French-fighter-planes-grounded-by-computer-virus.html

French fighter planes grounded by computer virus
French fighter planes were unable to take off after military computers were infected by a computer virus, an intelligence magazine claims.

by Kim Willsher in Paris
Last Updated: 9:52PM GMT 07 Feb 2009

The aircraft were unable to download their flight plans after databases were infected by a Microsoft virus they had already been warned about several months beforehand.

At one point French naval staff were also instructed not to even open their computers.

<snip>

According to Liberation newspaper, two days later the chiefs of staff decided to isolate Intramar from the military's other computer systems, but certain computers at the Villacoublay air base and in the 8th Transmissions Regiment were infected. Liberation reported that on the 15 and 16 January the Navy's Rafale aircraft were "nailed to the ground" because they were unable to "download their flight plans". The aircraft were eventually activated by "another system".

<snip>

The French press also reported that the only consolation for the French Navy was that it was not the only ones to have fallen victim to the virus. It said that a report in the military review Defense Tech revealed that in the first days of January 2009 the British Defence Ministry had been attacked by a hybrid of the virus that had substantially and seriously infected the computer systems of more than 24 RAF bases and 75 per cent of the Royal Navy fleet including the aircraft carrier Ark Royal.

[hobbit709]

1. All I got to say

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

[ixion]

2. second that

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

what do they expect?

[BR_Parkway]

3. Seems like if one country wants to attack another, this would be an

effective first step - prevent them from striking back. Gives a whole new meaning to the term Electronic Warfare

[nebenaube]

4. They learned nothing from the code red worm... nothing

"All your base is belong to us"

[krispos42]

5. "Hey, this Yankee in Iraq found some of Saddam's gold..."

"He say's he'll split it with me!" <click> "Oh, bloody 'ell!"

[Orsino]

6. Get a Mac.

This being the standard response.

[Thor_MN]

7. Maybe things have changed, but I don't see being able to plug a jet fighter into a computer

that can't be enhanced with other than Apple products. The current stuff may be more expandable, but for the longest time, it was "You better love it out of the box, because that's all it will ever be."

I admit I'm biased, but my background was in capturing data from analytical instruments, before the instuments had computers built into them. In that environment, the only thing you could do with a Mac was to hand enter the data through the keyboard. You could then turn into a real pretty report, but that was about it. I just don't see a jet fighter as being a good choice of peripheral for a MAC...

[Orsino]

8. Infidel!

Macs are the one true way. :7