Thursday, Aug 30, 2012

By Summer Said

RIYADH--A computer virus that has shut down part of a computer system at Qatar's Ras Laffan Liquefied Natural Gas Co., known as RasGas, is believed to be the Shamoon virus, a person familiar with the situation said Thursday.

The RasGas information technology department identified the virus to personnel as Shamoon, the person said.

Following the virus attack, some "computers are completely dead," the person said.

A virus that shut down some computer systems earlier this month at state-giant Saudi Arabian Oil Co., known as Saudi Aramco, is also widely believed to have been called the Shamoon virus.

Saudi Aramco, the world's largest oil company, has not named the cause of its problems, but according to cyber-security firm Symantec, Shamoon first emerged the day after the attacks on the Saudi company. Symantec also confirmed on its web site that the virus had attacked, "at least one organization in the energy sector."

RasGas said Thursday in a statement that it has been attacked by a computer virus that has shut down part of its computer system since Aug. 27, but left its production unharmed. The RasGas statement didn't identify the virus by name or say whether it was the same one that attacked Saudi Aramco.

RasGas desktop computers were affected, but operational systems both on site and offshore are secure, the world's second-biggest LNG producer said.

The bug did "not affect production at the Ras Laffan Industrial City plant or scheduled cargoes," RasGas said.

Saudi Aramco's virus attack earlier this month originated from external sources. The attack forced the world's largest oil producer to isolate all of its electronic systems from outside access, but didn't affect operations.

Aramco said Sunday it has restored all of its main internal network services, and workstations have since been cleaned and restored. As a precaution, it said, remote Internet access to online resources was restricted.

Write to Summer Said at summer.said@dowjones.com

(James Herron in London contributed to this article.)

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

30-08-12 1631GMT