Gholamreza Aghazadeh, head of Iran's Atomic Energy Organization visits the Natanz uranium enrichment facilities 200 miles (322 km) south of Tehran, Iran. (Photo credit:UPI Photo/President's official website)

Last week, Mikko Hypponen, the chief researcher of F-Secure (a security firm based in Finland), released an email he received from a nuclear scientist working at the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI). Apparently, workstations are now randomly blasting ‘Thunderstruck’ by AC/DC in the middle of the night. The scientist writes:

I am writing you to inform you that our nuclear program has once again been compromised and attacked by a new worm with exploits which have shut down our automation network at Natanz and another facility Fordo near Qom.

According to the email our cyber experts sent to our teams, they believe a hacker tool Metasploit was used. The hackers had access to our VPN. The automation network and Siemens hardware were attacked and shut down. I only know very little about these cyber issues as I am scientist not a computer expert.

There was also some music playing randomly on several of the workstations during the middle of the night with the volume maxed out. I believe it was playing ‘Thunderstruck’ by AC/DC.

It is no secret that Iran’s nuclear infrastructure has fallen victim to several cyber attacks over the past few years. In his new book, David Sanger outlines in detail the extent to which “Olympic Games,” the codename given to a joint Israeli-American operation to hack Iranian nuclear facilities, has successfully hindered Iran’s enrichment capacity.

 

This is also not the first time AC/DC has dogged American adversaries. According to William J. Broad at The Lede, in 1989, American troops bombarded Manuel Noriega’s hideout in the Vatican embassy with “You Shook Me All Night Long” – also by AC/DC.

For those of your unfamiliar with AC/DC’s “Thunderstruck,” here it is: