Researchers Connect Flame to U.S.-Israel Stuxnet Attack

Wired: Security researchers from Kaspersky Lab say they have found evidence that ties the Flame malware to the Stuxnet virus, which the U.S. and Israel reportedly developed and launched to attack Iran’s nuclear capabilities. According to Kaspersky, the Flame module which allows the malware to spread via USB sticks is virtually identical to a module included in the original version of Stuxnet. “It obviously shows that these teams were somewhat tight, so to say. They were actually comfortable giving the source code to someone else,” said Kaspersky’s Roel Schouwenberg.

The researchers now believe that Flame was developed before Stuxnet and that the teams creating both pieces of malware cooperated in the beginning. Schouwenberg characterized the finding as one of “the biggest discoveries to date about Flame.”