An interesting essay linking railroad gauges, the Great Blackout of 2003, Sobig and MSBlast.
NY Times: In Frayed Networks, Common Threads. Taken together, the blackout and the worm underscore a far-reaching challenge in managing modern technological societies: the difficulty of reaping the benefits of networks – railroad networks, airline networks, telephone networks, power networks and computer networks, among others – while minimizing their vulnerabilities. [Tomalak’s Realm]