Bush briefed on anti-U.S. cyberattack

A recent cyberattack on U.S. military computers was so severe, U.S. President George Bush was briefed on the situation, sources said.

The attack targeted the computers of the U.S. Central Command, which has responsibility over forces fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan, and affected computers on the battlefield, unnamed sources told Friday's Los Angeles Times. The scale of the cyberattack -- which appears to have originated in Russia -- was big enough and its implications for national security significant enough to alert Bush, the sources said.

This one was significant; this one got our attention, an unnamed U.S. Defense Department official told the newspaper.

Bush and U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates were reportedly briefed on the situation by Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Adm. Michael Mullen.

In the attack, malicious software specially designed to disable military computers was planted onto servers. Sources told the Times experts have not yet pinpointed the exact source of the attack, nor have they yet determined a motive and cannot yet say whether the Russian government may have had some involvement.

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