The New York Times has a bombshell this morning: President Obama began ordering cyberattacks on Iran within days of taking office. The story, which is a must-read, finally confirms what many cybersecurity experts have suspected: the Stuxnet worm, which disabled industrial equipment in Iran and Europe, was originally designed by Israel and the U.S. to slow down Iran's nuclear enrichment plant. The virus' escape from Iran's Natanz plant and subsequent discovery in Germany in 2010 was a mistake that U.S. authorities blamed on Israel. Former CIA chief Michael Hayden also acknowledged to the Times that Stuxnet is the first major cyberattack intended to cause physical destruction (to Iranian centrifuges). "Somebody crossed the Rubicon," he said.

The article includes a history of the classified cyberweapons program, dubbed "Olympic Games," which began under President Bush, and includes details of how President Obama decided that digital attacks were preferable to a potential military conflict between Iran and Israel. But the bottom line is that President Obama (and his predecessor) ordered a sophisticated campaign of cyberattacks against Iran's nuclear program, and has either attacked or considered attacking networks in China, Syria, and North Korea as well. The Obama administration previously acknowledged that it might respond to cyberattacks with physical force, but the report makes it clear that even as the U.S. was making those threats, it was perpetrating cyberattacks on the very nations it accuses of targeting its networks.

In doing so, the White House has seemingly opened a Pandora's box. Administration officials have placed a greater emphasis on cybersecurity and the threat to our nation's networks that any previous administration, doubtless because they had first-hand knowledge of just how much damage sophisticated cyberattacks are capable of causing. Those officials might have also feared reprisals from nations that were targeted by Stuxnet and other digital attacks from the U.S. The revelation also sheds some light on the Pentagon's reluctance to outline its cyberwarfare policies in detail, since doing so might have involved disclosing to Congress that the U.S. already was fully engaged in online battle.

Having taken such an aggressive stance on deploying Stuxnet, it will be very difficult for the U.S. to keep casting itself as the innocent victim of unprovoked attacks by countries looking to steal our economic and military secrets. Today's report makes it clear that the White House long ago decided to embrace digital warfare, and puts the onus squarely back on the administration to clearly explain its rules of engagement online. But the greatest impact may be internationally, where hostile nations now have confirmation the U.S. could be targeting their networks. If hackers in those countries weren't already attempting to take down U.S. critical infrastructure, they probably are now.

Democrats Want Conditions on FISA Extension: CQ's Tim Starks reports House Democrats are raising privacy and constitutional concerns over an extension of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which allows warrantless surveillance of foreign targets. The bill allows monitoring of the targets even when they are communicating with U.S. citizens, prompting some Democrats and civil liberties groups to request conditions that would disclose how many Americans had their communications intercepted. Despite the concerns, the extension appears likely to pass when it is taken up by the House Judiciary and Intelligence Committees. Hearing Coming on National Weather Service Budget Flap: The chairman of the House Appropriations Commerce-Justice-Science Subcommittee intends to examine the budget scandal currently unfolding at the National Weather Service. CQ's Kerry Young reports that Frank Wolf, R-Va., plans to hold a hearing in June featuring the head of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, to explain why some NWS funds were shifted between accounts in an apparent bid to save jobs at the expense of some equipment upgrades. The budget shifts took place without congressional approval and prompted the resignation of NWS director Jack Hayes. NWS is now seeking congressional approval to reprogram $26 million of its budget, but lawmakers are skeptical in the face of the agency's recent actions. Except considerable displeasure from lawmakers when the hearing takes place, with additional cuts to the agency's budget also possible.

The Economist's Science and Technology Quarterly is out today and available online. Here are some highlights:

The Internet Land Rush: ICANN's decision to open up new domain suffixes (.com, .biz, .org, etc.) has prompted a flood of new registrations, and a healthy share of controversy. Many companies are less than pleased about having to pay hefty prices to register the domains, just to prevent them from falling into the wrong hands. Other complaints involve big companies applying for generic terms that could apply to an entire industry (Google, for example, has applied for .docs and .lol). ICANN's mixed track record of management also has raised concerns as the number of available domains increases dramatically. A significant mishap could escalate calls for the U.N. to take over regulation of the Internet, but the U.S. is strongly opposed to such a shift. Someone Call Phillip K. Dick: The increasingly autonomous nature of robots is posing technical and moral challenges that wouldn't be out of place in your average science fiction novel. New technologies such as military drones and driverless cars raise the possibility that robots will eventually have to make ethical decisions, which will force their makers to grapple with those same questions. Isaac Asimov's "Three Laws of Robotics" is the best-known attempt to grapple with those questions, but policymakers will have to give them a serious look in the near future.