This was one of the most enlightening documentaries I've seen in recent years; it was also one of the most disturbing films I've seen in a long time. I had no idea how far into the age of cyberwarfare we already are, and how serious the consequences of this kind of conflict already can be. If you're a conspiracy theorist or otherwise prone to paranoia, don't watch this - but if you want to learn some of the darker secrets most government agencies try to shield our fragile little minds from, and if you want to know some hard truths about what's possible and what's already happening in terms of cyberattacks, I highly recommend this excellent documentary. 9 stars out of 10.Favorite films: IMDb.com/list/mkjOKvqlSBs/Favorite TV-Shows reviewed: imdb.com/list/ls075552387/Lesser-Known Masterpieces: imdb.com/list/ls070242495/Favorite Low-Budget and B-Movies: imdb.com/list/ls054808375/

Zero Days is my latest review. It begins with a car exploding and a creepy, modulated voice speaking (hello "lawnmower man"). That's the vein of its excitement. At nearly two hours, this is a overly talky documentary, bent on chronicling the Stuxnet computer virus and how it posed a threat to Internet access all over the world. Stuxnet was a malicious worm. It involved the nuclear proclamations of the U.S. and Iran. Sadly, an insurance seminar is "Zero's" equivalent. A college disquisition is its symposium. This is painstakingly educational stuff. Director Alex Gibney takes his account all the way from 1979's Iranian flag burning to said Stuxnet Trojan Horse in 2010. His docu skills aren't sloppy yet his flick crawls around in circles. Zero Days is very thought-out, very calculated, soberly streamlined, and intelligent to a fault. It gets to the point where Gibney makes Michael Moore, Morgan Spurlock, and Steve James out to look like slipshod artists. In truth, you wonder if he actually required multiple takes with the real-life experts he was talking to. Now does Alex keep his audience alert to his conspiracies, his swift ending, his relentless use of news archives, and his barrage of uniform, cinematic techniques? That remains to be seen. Does his methods channel his elongated film to accrue true greatness? Not exactly.Alex "I'm taking vigorous notes" Gibney fills the screen with lots of interviews (people are either not revealing much or hiding their faces), locales all over the world, slight visual storytelling, and images of code with Matrix-like tendencies. He goes off on tangents, even projecting an ocular segment akin to Blade Runner's cityscape. Ugh. In jest, there's almost too much information to take in. I'm no dummy but I was a bit addled. The eerie musical score helps a little but whatever entertainment value exists, it could only satisfy hardcore, cyber geeks. Oh and I almost forgot, Hillary Clinton, Ronald Reagan, Barack Obama, and George W. Bush are all in the cast credits. Too bad you never really hear from them based on their scattershot, newsreel appearances. Rating: 2 and a half stars.

This two-hour documentary released Friday, July 8, and playing in selected theaters and streaming online, traces the history and consequences of Stuxnet, a sophisticated piece of malware unleashed on the world in 2010. Before you yawn and click away, there's an important feature of the Stuxnet worm and others like it that makes this story of vital interest to you. Stuxnet was not designed to invade your home or office computer, but to attack the industrial control systems that manage critical infrastructure. These systems make sure trains and airplanes don't crash, control car and truck traffic, maintain oil and gas production, manage industrial automation, ensure you have water to brush your teeth with and electricity to run the coffee maker, keep life-saving medical technology operating, and, of course, give you access to the internet. Cyber-attacks on these systems cause real-world, physical destruction, even widespread death. Behind the Computer Screen The Stuxnet story—still highly classified, but revealed over time—began with an effort by the United States and Israel to thwart Iran's ability to produce nuclear weapons by destroying centrifuges at the country's Natanz uranium enrichment facility. The software was diabolically clever, virtually undetectable, and essentially untraceable. In theory. The fact that it was a Zero Day exploit--that is, that the attack would begin before the software problem was discovered and attempts made to fix it or shut it down--and that the Stuxnet code contained not one, but four zero day features, was remarkable. Once it was inside, it worked autonomously; even the attacker could not call it back. The Israelis, apparently, were impatient. They assassinated Iranian nuclear scientists, and they changed the Stuxnet code, and it spread. It ended up infecting computers worldwide, at which point it was no longer secret, people were looking for it, and the Russians and others found it. "Israel blew the (malware's) cover and it could have led to war," the film says. Another consequence is that the day when something similar can be unleashed on us grows ever closer. It will come from one of three sources: • Cybercriminals, in it for the money • Activists, intent on making a political point or • Nation-states seeking intelligence or opportunities for sabotage. U.S. security agencies are not complacent. While they talk publicly about our cyber-defenses, in fact, there is a large (unexamined) effort to develop offensive cyber-weapons. There are reports of an even more draconian cyber-weapon embedded throughout Iranian institutions. Warding off its activation is believed a primary reason the Iranians finally struck a nuclear agreement. Certainly it prompted the rapid development surge in Iran's cyberarmy. In putting this story together, writer and director Alex Gibney interviewed former high-ranking U.S. and Israeli security officials, analysts from Symantec who teased the code apart, personnel from Russia's Kaspersky Lab, and many others, including CIA/NSA/DoD officials unable to speak on camera. "Fear Does Not Protect Us" The documentary makes a persuasive case for who holds the smoking Stuxnet gun, but it also suggests that finding fault is not the primary issue. The climate of international secrecy around Stuxnet—and the inevitable clones that will follow—makes an open discussion about them impossible. Nor does it allow development of rational strategies for managing the risks, regardless of how urgently needed those strategies are. Cyber-risk management will never be easy, but as one of the film's experts points out, "it will never happen unless you start." The subject is "hideously overclassified," says Michael Hayden, former director of both the NSA and CIA. (The climate of secrecy is so extreme that even the U.S. Department of Homeland Security cyber team was unaware that Stuxnet originated across town and spent countless resources trying to track it down.) We, of all nations, need this debate, because there is no more vulnerable country in the world, when it comes to systems' connectedness. "Evil and good live side by side," says an anonymous agent of the Israeli intelligence agency, Mossad. Keeping secrets is a good way to prevent being able to tell one from the other.

The new weapons of warfare (specifically computer viruses) and the climate of secrecy and legality, in which such weapons are used are excellently portrayed in this documentary. Experts of high standing from both the intelligence and cyber security communities have been interviewed and their insights and opinions wonderfully woven together to tell the story of the most complex stealth- like computer virus to have targeted very specific critical infrastructure to date, aka 'The Stuxnet' virus This documentary covers new ground in documentary film making and uses the Stuxnet virus as a platform to explain many of the complexities, secrecy and politics involved with international cyber warfare and the dangers and to some extent morality of it. Essential informative viewing without doubt!