Saudi Oil Producer’s Computers Restored After Cyberattack

The following is an excerpt from an article in 

The New York Times
Monday, August 27, 2012

Saudi Oil Producer’s Computers Restored After Cyberattack

By REUTERS DUBAI (Reuters) — Saudi Aramco, the world’s biggest oil producer, has resumed operating its main internal computer networks after a virus infected about 30,000 of its workstations earlier this month, the company said Sunday.

Immediately after the Aug. 15 attack, the company announced it had cut off its electronic systems from outside access to prevent further attacks.

On Sunday, Saudi Aramco said the workstations had been cleansed of the virus and restored to service. Oil exploration and production were not affected because they operate on isolated systems, it said.

“We would like to emphasize and assure our stakeholders, customers and partners that our core businesses of oil and gas exploration, production and distribution from the wellhead to the distribution network were unaffected and are functioning as reliably as ever,” Saudi Aramco’s chief executive, Khalid al-Falih, said in a statement.

However, one of Saudi Aramco’s Web sites taken offline after the attack — www.aramco.com — remained down on Sunday. E-mails sent by Reuters to people within the company continued to bounce back.

The company said that the virus “originated from external sources,” and that an investigation into the causes of the incident and those responsible was continuing. It did not elaborate.

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