Du skal se dokumentaren om Stuxnet

Omkring år 2010 løb Irans atomprogram ind i mystiske problemer: Dels blev flere af deres atomfysikere snigmyrdet, dels brød centrifugerne på deres anlæg til forarbejdning af uran sammen. Problemerne viste sig at skyldes ondsindet software, der af Symantec fik navnet Stuxnet.

Stod Israel bag? Stod USA bag? Hvordan kunne det lade sig gøre at inficere det topsikre anlæg? Og ikke mindst: Hvad betyder alt dette for vores fremtidige opfattelse af it-sikkerhed og krigsførelse i cyberspace?

I understand the difference in destruction is dramatic, but this has the whiff of August 1945. Somebody just used a new weapon, and this weapon will not be put back into the box.

Ikke blot udpensler dokumentaren Zero Days mange flere detaljer, end jeg havde turdet håbe på, - som ganske vist til syvende og sidst hænger på anonyme kilder - den ender også med at underbygge en opfordring om at få en Genevekonvention for cyberkrig. Og det er da flot klaret, når man tænker på, det er en hel film om én computer-orm.

When you shut down a country's power grid, it doesn't just pop back up, you know. It's more like humpty-dumpty... And if all the king's men can't turn the lights back on or filter the water for weeks, then lots of people die. And something we can do to others, they can do to us too. Is that something that we should keep quiet? Or should we talk about it?

Jeg giver ikke filmen topkarakterer. Dertil er der for mange klip med kilder, der ikke vil udtale sig, og for uspændende formidling om selve softwaren. Men filmen er sindsygt væsentlig og absolut et must see, hvis man vil hævde at vide noget som helst om Irans atomprogram eller cyberwarfare.

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Greenland to export uranium & rare earth minerals to China?

Perhaps you have already heard oil corporations are looking for oil in the Arctic seas around Greenland. But also the Chinese show some interest in Denmark, Greenland's mineral wealth especially. Greenland holds untouched resources of uranium which pose a dilemma to the nuclear free kingdom. Recently, Hu Jintao visited Denmark and Danish politicians visited China.

"I hope we can soon change the zero tolerance [towards nuclear industries] and have the uranium that we have extracted, instead of being an Arctic open-air museum." - Doris Jakobsen, Greenland politician

"Such production will be a game changer for the otherwise non-nuclear kingdom that is uninformed and virginal in this area. It will raise the kingdom's importance internationally because it will be a [world top-10] producer. Historically we've been spared from considering this." - Cindy Vestergaard, researcher at DIIS

"I don't think there are countries eager to obtain uranium for nuclear weapons use. Despite that uranium could still be spread. But countries that would be interested in uranium for weapons have been able to get it all the time." - Per Kalvig researcher at GEUS

Quick Google Translate aided quotes from Information.dk / Skal Grønland være storeksportør af uran?

Greenland Mining and Energy Ltd looking for uranium in Narsaq, south Greenland.

"We were allowed to talk about Greenland's autonomy to the members of the local [Tibetan] government and Communist Party, and there was great interest from people in Yushu." - Doris Jakobsen, Greenland politician

Quick Google Translate aided quotes from Information.dk / Grønlandsk varsomhed over for Kina

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Israel built its nuclear bombs with stolen Egyptian uranium

Funny how so many of Israels wars and occupied territories just happen to include a tale of a natural resource. There is the Palestinian water, the off shore gas and now: the Egyptian uranium. See 'Israel secretly exploited Egypt's uranium'; a story seen a couple of places around the net.

According to this story, Israel built its nuclear bombs using uranium taken from the Sinai Peninsula [Wikipedia] during the 1950ies. Israel has had various military operations on the peninsula in the course of its conflicts with Arab countries including a brief invasion in 1956. According to the official secret of Israels nuclear weapons the uranium used was from low quality deposits in the Negev desert. Perhaps not?

This story is told by 83-year-old Israeli Professor Uriel Bachrach who worked for the Science Corps of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). In his recent Hebrew only book, The Power of Knowledge, he reveals how he participated in an undercover operation in the Sinai; disguised as German engineers. Very interesting - but I would like some more and better sources on the story from the book than Arab media briefs.

In Niger, a war for what's beneath the desert

A battle is unfolding on the stark mountains and scalloped dunes of northern Niger between a band of Tuareg nomads, who claim the riches beneath their homeland are being taken by a government that gives them little in return, and an army that calls the fighters drug traffickers and bandits.

...new screenwriter badly needed... this plot won't make another news block buster!

Niger's northern desert caps one of the world's largest deposits of uranium, and demand for it has surged as global warming has increased interest in nuclear power. Growing economies like China and India are scouring the globe for the crumbly ore known as yellowcake. A French mining company is building the world's largest uranium mine in northern Niger, and a Chinese state company is building another mine nearby.

Uranium could infuse Niger with enough cash to catapult it out of the kind of poverty that causes one in five children here to die before their fifth birthday.

Or it could end in a calamitous war that leaves Niger more destitute than ever. Mineral wealth has fueled conflict across Africa for decades, a series of bloody, smash-and-grab rebellions that shattered nations. The misery wrought has left many Africans to conclude that mineral wealth is a curse.

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The hardships of global warming and desertification, which eats away grazing land, further impoverished the Tuareg, forcing many to abandon herding. Yet as its fertility degraded, their land became increasingly sought after as the global price of uranium rose steadily. This paradox would prove explosive.