The United States and Israel are behind the Stuxnet worm

On January 15, 2011, the New York Times (NYT) said, the Stuxnet worm was created jointly by Israel and the US to target Iran's nuclear program.

Citing secret sources, NYT claims, Israel's secret nuclear facility in Dimona has been used to test the effectiveness of the Stuxnet worm on centrifuges like Iranian centrifuges deployed in intercontinental complexes. Natanz, and has been hampered by technical problems.

NYT hypothesizes that the virus was designed as an US-Israel project to undermine Iran's program.

Stuxnet first came to light in June 2010, but it may have targeted Iran since mid-2009. Stuxnet has been analyzed by security researchers, most notably the 3-person team at Symantec. and Ralph Langner of Langner Communications GmbH (Germany).

According to both Symantec and Langner, Stuxnet could very well be designed to penetrate Iran's nuclear enrichment program, hidden under supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) systems that operate Iranian facilities, later. It forces the centrifugal motor to spin at an unsafe speed. Centrifuges (used to enrich uranium) can be damaged if turned too quickly.

On November 29, 2010, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad admitted that a number of "finite" centrifuges were affected by software that he claimed to have been installed by enemies of the country. . This is the first time an Iranian official has admitted to attacking his country's uranium enrichment machine .