Today on New Scientist: 9 December 2012







Climate talks stumbling towards a deal

As the Qatar climate summit looks set to run into the weekend, we look at some key issues, such as compensation for poor countries harmed by climate change



Twin spacecraft map the mass of the man in the moon

Two satellites called Ebb and Flow have revealed the fine variations in the moon's surface with the most detailed gravity map ever



Just cut down on fat to shed weight

A review of studies involving 75,000 people shows that simply eating less fat made them lighter



North-east Japan quake rattles same fault as last year

A new quake off Japan's Pacific coast revives memories of 2011 tsunami; Fukushima nuclear power station "undamaged"



YouTube reorganises video with automated channels

Software that automatically classifies video into channels catering to specific interests is YouTube's latest ploy to become the future of television



A mathematician's magnificent failure to explain life

An attempt to explain life was career suicide for mathematician Dorothy Wrinch, we learn from Marjorie Senechal's biography I Died for Beauty



Parasite makes mice fearless by hijacking immune cells

The Toxoplasma parasite does its dirty work by getting immune cells to make a chemical normally found in the brain



'Specialist knowledge is useless and unhelpful'

Kaggle.com has turned data prediction into sport. People competing to solve problems are outclassing the specialists, says its president Jeremy Howard



Feedback: Numerical value of 'don't know'

The value of indifference, carbon-free sugar, scientists massacred in the nude, and more



Friday Illusion: 100-year-old quilt reveals 3D vortex

See a mind-bending effect crafted into a recently discovered quilt that changes depending on its colours and dimensions



Space-time waves may be hiding in dead star pulses

The first direct detection of gravitational waves may happen in 2013, if new studies of pulsars affected by galaxy mergers are correct



2012 Flash Fiction shortlist: Go D

From nearly 130 science-inspired stories, our judge Alice LaPlante has narrowed down a fantastic shortlist. Story five of five: Go D by Michael Rolfe



Captured: the moment photosynthesis changed the world

For the first time, geologists have found evidence of how modern photosynthesis evolved 2.4 billion years ago



Commute to work on the roller coaster train

A Japanese train based on a theme park ride could make getting around cleaner - and more fun



BSE infected cattle have prions in saliva

The discovery of tiny levels of prions in cow saliva might pave way for a test for BSE before symptoms develop, and raises questions about transmission



Space bigwigs offer billion-dollar private moon trips

Robots aren't the only ones heading to the moon. The Golden Spike Company will sell you a ticket whether you want to explore, mine or just show off



Human eye proteins detect red beyond red

Tweaking the structure of a protein found in the eye has given it the ability to react to red light that is normally unperceivable




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Supreme Court to take up issue of gay marriage






WASHINGTON: The US Supreme Court has decided to take up the sensitive issue of gay marriage, hearing challenges to a federal law denying benefits to same-sex couples and California's ban on such unions.

The highest US court will likely hear arguments in the cases in March 2013, with rulings to come in June. Same-sex marriage is currently legal in nine states and the federal capital Washington but barred in 30 other states.

Campaigners on both sides of the debate over marriage equality hailed the court's decision to take up the issue -- although they obviously backed differing views as to what constitutes marriage and family.

As analysts predicted, the court took up one challenge to the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), which defines marriage as the legal union of one man and one woman and denies federal benefits to married same-sex couples.

Benefits enjoyed by heterosexual married couples but denied to gays include inheritance rights, tax breaks, filing of joint income tax returns, and health insurance coverage.

President Barack Obama's government does not support this view of marriage and would like the law to be overturned, but conservative campaigners are urging the Supreme Court to rule that the act is constitutional.

The specific case to be heard involves Edith Windsor, a lesbian legally married in Canada who has been told to pay tax on inheriting the estate of her deceased partner.

"While Thea is no longer alive, I know how proud she would have been to see this day. The truth is, I never expected any less from my country," Windsor said in a statement from the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU).

The Supreme Court will rule whether DOMA violates the guarantee of equal protection under the law as guaranteed by the fifth amendment of the US constitution.

It will also decide if the Obama administration's position that DOMA is unconstitutional deprives the Supreme Court of jurisdiction, and whether a complaint by some US lawmakers has legal standing.

Justice Elena Kagan, as Obama's former solicitor general has recused herself on some of the cases in which she had played a role, but this is one on which she can participate.

Kagan's participation avoids the potential for a 4-4 split on the nine-member bench.

The other case taken up was brought by supporters of "Prop 8," a referendum that passed in California in 2008 that defined marriage as being between a "man and a woman" -- but which was overturned by a court of appeal.

If the Supreme Court throws out their appeal, California -- the country's most populous state -- will in effect become the 10th state to permit gay marriage.

In Hollingsworth v Perry, the court will decide whether the 14th amendment of the US constitution, which requires states to provide equal protection under the law to all people, prohibits California from banning gay marriage.

The Supreme Court will also decide whether the petitioners have legal standing in the case.

"Today is a milestone day for equal justice under the law and for millions of loving couples who want to make a lifelong commitment through marriage," said Chad Griffin, president of the Human Rights Campaign, a national gay rights organization.

"As the court has ruled 14 times in the past, marriage is a fundamental right and I believe they will side with liberty, freedom and equality, moving us toward a more perfect union as they have done in the past."

The conservative Family Research Council was also pleased, with president Tony Perkins saying in a statement: "Virtually nothing is more important to the future of our country than marriage and the family."

"The argument that the authors of our Constitution created or even implied a 'right' to redefine 'marriage' lies outside our constitutional law," Perkins added.

Justices did not say what they planned to do with eight other gay marriage petitions they debated behind closed doors on Friday.

It is likely that these, along with a last-minute case on the gay marriage ban in Nevada, will not be heard. But the Supreme Court could also rule that whatever decision it reaches in June should prevail over all the pending cases -- not just the ones heard.

As a country, the United States appears to be slowly moving towards tolerating same-sex unions.

An opinion poll by USA Today/Gallup released this week ahead of the court's decision showed that 53 percent of Americans believe same-sex marriage should be legal, up from 40 percent just three years ago.

Within the lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender (LGBT) community, the poll showed that 91 percent felt residents in their communities had become more accepting of homosexuals in recent years.

Among those whose position has evolved over this period is Obama himself, who always backed strong protections for gay and lesbian couples, but only came out openly in favor of homosexual marriage earlier this year.

"I've just concluded, for me, personally, it is important for me to go ahead and affirm that I think same-sex couples should be able to get married," Obama said in a May interview with ABC News.

The president said however that a decision on whether to legalize gay marriage should be left to individual states.

- AFP/ck



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Hot new games for iOS



The stars lined up just right this week (read: gift-giving season is here!) to have a number of awesome game sequels and new releases launch all at once. Frankly, there are so many new games that there is no better time than the present to check out what the App Store has to offer.


Rick Broida already wrote about Grand Theft Auto: Vice City earlier today, but there are plenty more that would make nice additions to your iOS gaming collection.


This week's collection of apps is a group of excellent games released over the course of this week. The first is a funny and fun dual-stick shooter with tons of weapons to collect. The second is the latest installment in probably the best FPS franchise at the App Store. The third is a port of an old game to the
iPad (and only the iPad), but it might be the most famous classic RPG ever.


Minigore 2: Zombies ($1.99) is the sequel to the fun and funny dual-stick shooter Minigore. The graphics in this zombie-themed sequel still have that funny block-head look, but you're no longer fighting the furry baddies; now you're blowing away the undead.



Minigore 2: Zombies

Part of the fun in the game is John Gore's constant grimace as he blows away zombies.



(Credit:
Screenshot by Jason Parker/CNET)


Much like the first game in the series, Minigore 2 is all about mindless shooting in all directions as hordes of zombies and other creeps try to kill you. You'll also find several melee weapons like swords and giant hammers for close quarters combat. But just when you thought there couldn't be any more zombies swarming around you, a boss will appear that will take a lot of hits to bring down. Fortunately they often also drop a ton of coins so you can upgrade your weapons.


To acquire new weapons, you'll first need to buy them in the store. You get a machine gun for free, but you'll need to purchase new weapons to have them randomly show up in the game for a varied attack. Then, as you collect more coins, you can upgrade your weapons to make them more powerful, unlock new levels, and unlock new characters to play with. Each of the characters can be upgraded as well, helping you last longer against the endless shambling horde. Coins come pretty quickly as you play, so you'll soon be using weapons like shotguns, grenade launchers, and other powerful hardware.


Minigore 2: Zombies is all about mindless fun as you try to complete 300 in-game challenges, blow away 60 different types of enemies, and battle seven giant bosses. If you liked the first Mini Gore game, or just like the mindless action of dual-stick shooters, this sequel is one of the best.


Modern Combat 4: Zero Hour ($6.99) is the latest installment from Gameloft's incredibly popular Modern Combat franchise. While there's not much new gameplay wise, you have more terrorists to kill with a whole new story, and it's still probably the best FPS for the touch screen.



Modern Combat 4: Zero Hour

In one level you'll need to clear a path with a remote controlled drone.



(Credit:
Screenshot by Jason Parker/CNET)


In this latest sequel, the game challenges you to fight in countries around the world, from Barcelona to Africa, and you will find and use several different kinds of weapons as you complete mission objectives. In this installment, you will also have the option to play as the villain, giving you a whole different perspective on the game. The game is a universal download, so you can play on any of your iOS devices, but I think it is at its best on the iPad.


You get three different types of control schemes to pick from, with variations of onscreen joysticks and touch-screen actions. I found the default control method to work best for me, using a movement joystick on the left and the touch screen to aim and fire with my right thumb. Some added controls appear in certain situations where you need to pick up an item or jump down from a wall, for example. You can reload your weapon with a single tap on the gun in the upper right or you can double tap to switch weapons as you discover them in the game. One issue here is that the reload button is a little inconvenient (top right of screen) while playing on an iPad, but I was able to get used it after awhile. It still seems like it should be closer to your right thumb.


Though the touch screen will never be as easy to use as a keyboard and mouse or console controller, Modern Combat 4: Zero Hour manages to make the controls fairly easy to use. Auto aim (found in the options) helps a lot to offset the less-than-optimal controls in the beginning, but after spending some time with the game you'll be able turn it off for a more realistic experience.


Along with the fun gameplay, Modern Combat: Zero Hour has amazing graphics, great audio with satisfyingly explosive-sounding guns, and fairly good voice acting in-game and during cut scenes.


When you think you've honed your skills enough, you can take your game online and play in battles of up to 12 players, across eight maps, and in several game modes (FPS staples like Conquest and Capture the Flag are my current favorites). You also have four new specializations for your soldier (chosen before a match) to make him stronger at different strategies like Stealth or Support. Your starting soldier comes with fairly powerful weapons, but you'll need to play several games to earn coins in order to buy new ones. Judging by how populated the servers are so soon after launch, you'll be able to find plenty of games to play do increase your cash.


If you liked any of the earlier installments of Modern Combat, Zero Hour is an excellent choice with more-exciting gameplay, challenging missions, and probably the best graphics yet. If you like first-person shooters, this game is a must-have on your iOS device.


Baldur's Gate Enhanced Edition ($9.99 - iPad Only) is a touch screen recreation of the mega-hit classic RPG adventure game. While a game based on Dungeons and Dragons 2nd Edition rules is not for everyone, if you have the patience, tutorial levels teach you the basics so you can start your adventure.



Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition

As you explore dank dungeons, you'll need to use the abilities of every character to survive.



(Credit:
Screenshot by Jason Parker/CNET)


As the port of a game that was originally released in 1998, the graphics are not on par with today's games. Your isometric 3D view from above doesn't show off crystal clear graphics or smooth 3D modeling like you might be used to. But Balder's Gate was a huge fan favorite in its time for its epic storyline and complex gameplay, and the iOS version is a fantastic recreation. So while you won't be dazzled by the graphics, the gameplay definitely holds up, especially if you're a fan of Dungeons and Dragons type role-playing games.


You start by creating your character. Baldur's Gate has three preset options if you want to jump in right away, with a pre-rolled Fighter, Thief, or Mage. But you also can choose to pick from 11 available classes (Druids, Barbarians, Clerics, and more) and set up all the stats yourself, choose your skills or spells, and customize your look. The freedom to set up your own stats means you can customize your character exactly how you want, in effect making the 11 available classes starting points for your perfect character type. It's this type of customization that makes Baldur's Gate great, but it takes some time to learn the ins and outs of all the many skills, so don't expect to just jump in and start hacking away at bad guys.


Once you're in game, you'll quickly realize Baldur's Gate is incredibly complex, requiring you to manage six adventurers all of different classes (Rangers, Druids, Fighters, Wizards, and several others), each with their own abilities that you control. You'll even often need to hit the pause button in the middle of combat in order to plan each characters' moves and actions if you want to stand a chance against the game's many monsters.


To add to the confusion for new players, several skills and spells are not well labeled, making it difficult to pick out the exact action your trying to achieve. Though I was able to figure most of it out with some practice, you should definitely expect a learning curve here. Fortunately, you can experiment all you want in the tutorial levels, and I suggest you try to get familiar with the spell and skill icons before you get too far into the game.


Overall, Baldur's Gate is a faithful recreation of the popular 1998 original with 80 hours of epic RPG adventure and a large world to explore. If you like deep RPG games or played the original Baldur's Gate, this game is a worthwhile purchase.


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Plants Grow Fine Without Gravity


When researchers sent plants to the International Space Station in 2010, the flora wasn't meant to be decorative. Instead, the seeds of these small, white flowers—called Arabidopsis thaliana—were the subject of an experiment to study how plant roots developed in a weightless environment.

Gravity is an important influence on root growth, but the scientists found that their space plants didn't need it to flourish. The research team from the University of Florida in Gainesville thinks this ability is related to a plant's inherent ability to orient itself as it grows. Seeds germinated on the International Space Station sprouted roots that behaved like they would on Earth—growing away from the seed to seek nutrients and water in exactly the same pattern observed with gravity. (Related: "Beyond Gravity.")

Since the flowers were orbiting some 220 miles (350 kilometers) above the Earth at the time, the NASA-funded experiment suggests that plants still retain an earthy instinct when they don't have gravity as a guide.

"The role of gravity in plant growth and development in terrestrial environments is well understood," said plant geneticist and study co-author Anna-Lisa Paul, with the University of Florida in Gainesville. "What is less well understood is how plants respond when you remove gravity." (See a video about plant growth.)

The new study revealed that "features of plant growth we thought were a result of gravity acting on plant cells and organs do not actually require gravity," she added.

Paul and her collaborator Robert Ferl, a plant biologist at the University of Florida in Gainesville, monitored their plants from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida using images sent from the space station every six hours.

Root Growth

Grown on a nutrient-rich gel in clear petri plates, the space flowers showed familiar root growth patterns such as "skewing," where roots slant progressively as they branch out.

"When we saw the first pictures come back from orbit and saw that we had most of the skewing phenomenon we were quite surprised," Paul said.

Researchers have always thought that skewing was the result of gravity's effects on how the root tip interacts with the surfaces it encounters as it grows, she added. But Paul and Ferl suspect that in the absence of gravity, other cues take over that enable the plant to direct its roots away from the seed and light-seeking shoot. Those cues could include moisture, nutrients, and light avoidance.

"Bottom line is that although plants 'know' that they are in a novel environment, they ultimately do just fine," Paul said.

The finding further boosts the prospect of cultivating food plants in space and, eventually, on other planets.

"There's really no impediment to growing plants in microgravity, such as on a long-term mission to Mars, or in reduced-gravity environments such as in specialized greenhouses on Mars or the moon," Paul said. (Related: "Alien Trees Would Bloom Black on Worlds With Double Stars.")

The study findings appear in the latest issue of the journal BMC Plant Biology.


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Baby Gabriel's Mother Sentenced to Prison













Elizabeth Johnson -- who at one point admitted to killing her son, the missing infant Gabriel Johnson, before saying she gave him away -- told a judge she "deserved the maximum" sentence, before receiving a prison term of 5.25 years, half of the max.


In October, Johnson, 26, was found guilty of custodial interference and unlawful imprisonment stemming from the disappearance of her 8-month-old son, last seen on Dec. 24, 2009. The baby's whereabouts remain unknown.


"I am brokenhearted over my son still being missing," said Johnson, wearing a striped prison jumpsuit. "I'm at a loss because I do deserve the max. What I have done is unconscionable. I would convict myself.


"I do deserve the maximum, I do," she said through tears. "[But it] wasn't how [the prosecution] made it out to be. It wasn't like that. That's all I have to say."


Judge Paul McMurdie said he wished he could design a sentence that would compel Johnson to disclose Gabriel's whereabouts, but could only "sentence her for the offenses [for which] she's been convicted."


Johnson, 26, will serve 5.25 years in an Arizona state prison, followed by four years of probation.










At today's sentencing hearing, prosecutor Angela Andrews called Johnson' actions "despicable," but said the state would drop its request to see Johnson serve out a maximum sentence if she would tell authorities where her son could be found.


Johnson, who has been in jail for the past three years, faced a maximum of 9.5 years in prison on the two convictions. In October, the jury did not reach a verdict on a third charge of kidnapping.


Before Gabriel's disappearance, Johnson had been embroiled in a custody battle with the baby's biological father, Logan McQueary. The couple differed on putting their infant son up for adoption. Johnson had wanted to, McQueary did not.


"I think Elizabeth should be held accountable for her actions, for making my son disappear," Johnson told the court. "She should stay in jail until Gabriel is found or be given the maximum sentence as possible."


While she was fighting with McQueary over custody of their son, Johnson left Tempe, Ariz., with Gabriel and traveled to San Antonio, Texas, on Dec. 18, 2009. Johnson failed to bring Gabriel back to visit with McQueary two days later, violating a court custody order.


Gabriel was last seen with his mother on Dec. 26, 2009. The following day, Johnson sent text messages to McQueary saying she had killed him. Johnson was recorded telling McQueary that she suffocated their son with a towel until he turned blue. She said she then put his body in a diaper bag and put the bag in the trash.


Later, Johnson told authorities she gave Gabriel to a couple she met in a park in San Antonio, though she has never named who she gave the child to.


ABC News' Alexis Shaw contributed to this report.



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Space bigwigs offer billion-dollar private moon trips









































Robots aren't the only ones heading to the moon. The first private company offering regular trips to the lunar surface plans to start flights in 2020, shuttling people two at a time on exploratory missions. However, with an expected price tag of $1.4 billion per flight, or around $750 million per person, the trek would likely be out of reach for all but the wealthiest moonwalkers.











Today's announcement, at the National Press Club in Washington, DC backs up recent rumours that Alan Stern, a former administrator of NASA's Science Mission Directorate, had founded a company called Golden Spike in Colorado to run commercial moon trips.













Named for the final spike driven into the first US transcontinental railroad line, Golden Spike plans to market to governments, corporations and individuals to routinely send people to the moon for scientific purposes, to mine for resources or simply for prestige.












"Why the moon? Because it's close, because it's enormous, and because we think that there's going to be a strong market for it," says Stern. No tickets have yet been sold. But preliminary talks with space agencies in Asia and Europe are underway, he adds. "We see our main market as selling expeditions to foreign space agencies."











In 2010 President Barack Obama scrapped NASA's Constellation program for sending astronauts to the moon. Shortly afterwards, Stern convened a secret meeting of heavy-hitters in the space industry in Telluride, Colorado, to discuss the possibility of a private lunar mission. A four-month feasibility study led to the company's quiet founding later that year.












Beyond robots













Golden Spike now has several experienced directors and advisors, including Gerry Griffin, former director of NASA's Johnson Spaceflight Center, and Wayne Hale, former chief of NASA's space shuttle programme. It also boasts some colourful characters: Newt Gingrich, a former US presidential candidate who previously championed a lunar colony, and Mike Okuda, a set designer for the Star Trek franchise, are also on the advisory panel.











"One thing you can say about Stern is that he knows the game," says William Whittaker, CEO of Astrobotic Technology, one of many teams competing to put a robot on the moon and win the $20-million Google Lunar X Prize. "As NASA's former science director, he had a favoured insider's perspective. He knows people."













Although several of the firm's directors have NASA experience, Golden Spike will be a purely private enterprise that will not seek government funding, Stern says. The plan is to purchase a rocket and a crew capsule from one or more of the other private space enterprises that have sprung up in recent years, such as SpaceX or Blue Origin.












Golden Spike has signed contracts to begin development of a lunar lander and space suits. Its first lunar mission is expected to cost the company between $7 and $8 billion. To help cover expenses, the company plans to merchandise each mission, for instance, by selling the naming rights for their spacecraft.











Meanwhile, Space Adventures of Arlington, Virginia says it is on track to send people on flights that would circle the moon starting in 2016 or 2017. The price for each flight is $300 million, or $150 million per seat. There are two seats available for the maiden voyage, and one has already been sold, spokesperson Stacey Tearne told New Scientist.













Fred Bourgeois, head of FREDNET, another Lunar X Prize team, worries that the idea of sending people to the moon on private ships is premature. "We need to prove some things with robotic systems first, so we don't put lives at risk," he says. "I would not get on a private mission to the moon today, even though I would love to go."












But Stern says he's confident that robots will get to the moon's surface long before the first Golden Spike flights at the end of the decade. Human beings, he says, will then be needed for activities beyond the capabilities of a robot – from doing field geology to maintaining mining equipment. Says Stern: "We need to start now in order to be ready for the next phase."


















































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Bieber miffed at Grammys snub, Brubeck gets nod






LOS ANGELES: Justin Bieber's manager has lambasted the Grammys organisers after the Canadian teen sensation failed to garner a single nomination for this year's music awards.

At the other end of the musical spectrum, late jazz icon Dave Brubeck was honoured with a posthumous nod for the music industry's top prizes, in a little-noticed category at Wednesday night's nominations show.

"The kid deserved it. Grammy board u blew it on this one," tweeted the Bieb's manager Scooter Braum, after the Recording Academy failed to nominate him in any of its 81 categories.

"The kid delivered. Huge successful album, sold out tour, and won people over... this time he deserved to be recognized and I don't really have any kind nice positive things to say about a decision I don't agree with."

And he added: "To his fans... looks like we get to stay the underdog a little longer."

This year's Grammy nominees were announced at a one-hour show in Nashville on Wednesday night, with New York indie pop band fun. picking up six Grammy nominations in its breakout year.

Others with multiple nods for Grammy gongs, to be awarded on February 10 in Los Angeles, included rap artist Frank Ocean, The Black Keys, British rock-folk group Mumford & Sons and ex White Stripes rocker Jack White.

Wednesday's show included a brief mention for jazz pianist and composer Brubeck, hours after he died just short of his 92nd birthday.

Brubeck, whose 1959 album "Time Out" became the first million-selling jazz record of the modern era, with classics like "Take Five" and "Blue Rondo a la Turk", already won a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1996.

But he had never won an individual category Grammy.

That may change in February, after he was shortlisted for Best Instrumental Composition for "Music of Ansel Adams: America", a 22-minute piece inspired by the late photographer and environmentalist's famous black-and-white prints.

Brubeck's son Chris, credited as joint composer, brought the concept to his father who wrote it as a piano score, before his son reworked it into a full orchestral piece, according to industry weekly Billboard.

-AFP/fl



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Facebook says businesses have paid for 2.5 million promoted posts




Facebook released some new numbers today for its local business Pages, revealing that about 2 percent of the Pages have used promoted posts.


The social network said it's reached 13 million local Pages now -- up from the 12.8 million last reported during its earnings call in October -- and 300,000 of those pages have promoted more than 2.5 million posts. Promoted posts are ones that Pages pay for to make sure they reach more of their Facebook fans.


According to a Facebook spokesperson, Facebook's Director of Global SMB Markets Dan Levy went over some of these new numbers at the BIA/Kelsey's Interactive Local Media West Conference in Los Angeles.


Facebook's change to its News Feed algorithm earlier this year brought on some scrutiny over whether or promoted posts are worth the money, and worse, rumors saying Facebook making it more difficult to reach fans on purpose. The social network had to call a press conference to explain that it was just taking care of spam.


Facebook probably wants to share some numbers to show that there are still businesses that find their services valuable.


According to the numbers released today, 150 million people visit Facebook Pages daily, with half of them visiting through mobile devices. Over 3 million Page owners use Facebook's mobile advertisement management app, which launched six months ago, to buy their promoted posts.



The social network also boasts that the number of pages advertising on the social network has nearly doubled since January, according to Facebook. Active local Pages, a Page a business uses at least once a month, have increased by 40 percent. But, Facebook isn't saying how many Pages or active Pages existed in January.


This means we don't know exactly how quickly the number of Pages have grown in the last year, or how many new small businesses were willing to jump on the bandwagon.

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Space Pictures This Week: Lunar Gravity, Venusian Volcano









































































































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Not 'Wild West': Talking Cyber Ops at Iran's Backdoor












Robert Clark, the operational attorney for U.S. Cyber Command, stood in a grand ballroom with gold flaked ceilings and sparkling chandeliers to address an audience that included men in flowing white robes and veiled women and tried to hammer home a single point: cyber warfare is not the "Wild West."


Clark, who emphasized that he was speaking only in a personal capacity and not on behalf of the U.S. government, wanted to assure the relatively small gathering in the United Arab Emirates that in an age where a new "revolutionary" cyber weapon like Stuxnet is discovered every few months -- usually on computers in Iran, just across the Arabian Gulf -- legal considerations are taken into account before cyber attacks are launched.


"Articles that talk about cyber warfare and [say] that rules of engagement aren't evolving as fast as [the cyber attacks], it's just not true," Clark said. "We have the law of armed conflict applying to any type conflict and it applies to cyberspace operations also... It's just not the Wild West out there."




For most of his presentation, Clark spoke in generalities about the legal aspects of American cyber capabilities because despite the months-old admission from his boss, U.S. Cyber Command chief Gen. Keith Alexander, that the military is developing a "pro-active, agile cyber force," and the oft-cited New York Times report on America's role in developing Stuxnet, the devastating cyber weapon that hit an Iranian nuclear facility in late 2009, no current American officials have gone on record claiming responsibility for an offensive cyber attack.


However, emboldened by a government colleague's praise of Stuxnet earlier this year, Clark couldn't resist using it as a hypothetical example.


He said that before a weapon like Stuxnet would be launched, the same legal criteria would be considered as if it were a physical military attack. Is there an imminent threat from the target? Does it absolutely have to be taken out? Will the attack cause casualties or collateral damage that could and should be avoided?


Answering his own question about casualties, Clark echoed comments from colleague Air Force Col. Gary Brown when he noted the impressive restraint of the worm. Though Stuxnet was discovered on thousands of computers around the world in 2010, cyber researchers quickly realized that it was something of a smart bomb. It would spread harmlessly from computer to computer until it found itself on the exact system configuration -- a control system at an Iranian nuclear facility -- it was meant to target.


"Stuxnet," Clark said, "was a very discriminant weapon."


After Stuxnet was discovered and analyzed, Richard Clarke, a former White House counter-terrorism adviser and current ABC News consultant, said he thought that Stuxnet showed such care to limit collateral damage that it must have been developed with healthy input from anxious lawyers.


Robert Clark's presentation Wednesday was one of the first talks at the Black Hat security conference held at the opulent Emirate Palace Hotel in Abu Dhabi and though most of the presentations were highly technical, Clark wasn't the first and or the last to talk about the cyber struggle over Iran.






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