After what may be the most impressive cyber attack in history, Iran allegedly took control and possession of one of our RQ-170 Sentinel drones. Whether the success of this effort is the reason for increasing their cyber-warfare activities, the one billion dollars that they are allocating is a large program for Iran. The report below states that they will be funding both offensive and defensive capabilities.
Let’s hope that our president is more forceful with Iran if they are able to take control of one of our B-2 stealth bombers. Realistically, Iran will target our national electric grid first and water utilities second. China has already successfully attacked our water supply operations by damaging water pumps through cyber attacks.
David DeGerolamo
Iran embarking on ambitious $1b. cyber-warfare program
Tehran has embarked on an ambitious plan to boost its offensive and defensive cyber-warfare capabilities and is investing $1 billion in developing new technology and hiring new computer experts.
Iran has been the victim of a number of cyber attacks in recent years, some attributed to Israel. The most famous attack was by a virus called Stuxnet which is believed, at its prime, to have destroyed 1,000 centrifuges at the Natanz fuel enrichment facility by sabotaging their motors.
Iran recently confirmed that a new virus called Duqu had been detected in its computer systems, although the extent of the damage is unknown. While Stuxnet was aimed at crippling industrial control systems and may have destroyed some of the centrifugesIran uses to enrich uranium, experts say Duqu appeared designed to gather data to make it easier to launch future cyber attacks.
