"Any attempt to directly influence such an object (like attaching rockets or shooting it with something big) would just cause it to break up. You definitely don’t want that."

They should read their own article...

"The reflective surface of 1950 DA indicated it was largely composed of metal"

Yes, I want it broken up to make it easier to scale the metals down to Earth. sheesh.

and iron micro-asteroids.

The most likely answer.

Could also be ice.

If the object does not have enough mass, to bend space-time toward an object even larger, then it is just dust in the solar wind.