The Downadup worm, which spread with unprecedented speed in January, has claimed its latest victim by infecting French military computers and grounding fighter jets, according to French news sources.

The fighters were apparently unable to download their flight plans after databases were infected by Downadup.  The report goes on to say that at one point, French naval staff were also instructed not to even start their computers.

The French navy admitted that while disinfecting its networks, it had to return to more traditional forms of communication: telephone, fax and post.  Officials said the infection was probably due to a member of navy personnel using an infected USB key.

As we have mentioned in this blog before, this USB attack vector can be stopped with our Cruzer Enterprise secure USB flash drives with onboard anti-virus scanning.