Internet worms and critical infrastructure | CNET News.com
Let’s be fair. I don’t know that MSBlast caused the blackout. The report doesn’t say that MSBlast caused the blackout. Conventional wisdom is that MSBlast did not cause the blackout. But it’s certainly possible that MSBlast contributed to the blackout. The primary and backup computers that hosted the alarm systems failed at the same time MSBlast was attacking Windows computers on the Internet. What operating system were the alarm computers running? Were they on the Internet? These are interesting questions to know the answer to.
We do know that some companies sustained some quantifiable losses.
And Bill Joy’s recent critiques of Windows as a standalone system turned loose in a networked world makes this all the more maddening: what else is at risk in the name of expedience?