A set of documents originally released by Sky News, which was allegedly obtained from the Iranian cyber command, details plans by Iran to use cyber attacks to inflict real-world damage.
While notably the documents do not indicate that Iran was actively planning to execute these attacks at their inception, the country appears to be creating an arsenal of plans to call upon in the event of a war.
The strategies in the documents include using cyber attacks to sink container ships, attack infrastructure in foreign countries, attack facilities by making smart devices malfunction, and even a plan to make fuel pumps at gas stations explode.
While there are no specific indicators of an imminent attack, the documents indicate that Iran created these plans with the intention of directing these attacks against western countries; primarily the United States, United Kingdom and France.
The report was leaked to Sky News by an anonymous security source, who claims that they originate from the Shahid Kaveh offensive cyber unit of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ cyber command. The source believes that the agency is building a “target bank” to keep on standby for whenever the circumstance presents itself.
The documents focus heavily on attacking civilian infrastructure, something that has been a matter of heightened concern after recent attacks on the Colonial Pipeline and JBS. Each of the reports focus on a specific category or type of target, and most are dated in 2020.
General Sir Patrick Sanders, the top military officer overseeing UK cyber operations, told Sky News: “They are among the most advanced cyber actors. We take their capabilities seriously. We don’t overstate it. They are a serious actor and they have behaved really irresponsibly in the past.”