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10 August 2011 |
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Doubts shared by high-level Israeli officials over the feasibility of an effective physical strike against Iran's atomic infrastructure have prompted the establishment of a new armed forces office charged with conducting a computer offensive against Jerusalem's longtime rival, NewsCore reported on Sunday (see GSN, Aug. 8). The new entity within Israel's Unit 8200 signals intelligence group has so far infiltrated an Iranian online community service and completed a number of other "soft" spy activities, the London Times reported. “Israel has two principal targets in Iran’s cyberspace,” an informed defense insider said. “The first is its military nuclear program and its military establishment. The second is Iran’s civil infrastructure. Attacking both, we hope, will cripple the entire country’s cyberspace.” The Stuxnet computer worm caused Iranian uranium enrichment centrifuges to malfunction in 2009, according to NewsCore (see GSN, June 14).The malware's development has been commonly attributed to Israel and the United States, which both suspect Iran's enrichment program is geared toward weapons development. Tehran has maintained its atomic ambitions are strictly peaceful. “Israel must turn into a global cyber superpower,”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who would oversee the new
military computer center, reportedly said at a gathering of computer
defense specialists (NewsCore/Fox
News, Aug. 7). |
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