Newly surfaced reports reveal that the endgame of the Iranian cyberattack in April was to poison the water system in Israel.
Over the last couple of months, Israel and Iran have engaged in several cyberattacks. While it was known that Israeli water systems were the target of the Iranian attack back in April, what is now being revealed is that the aim of the hack was to poison Israeli water. Iran sought to accomplish this by infiltrating the system and increasing the chlorine output.
A western official is reported as stating the attack “Was more sophisticated than they (Israel) initially thought. It was close to successful, and it’s not fully clear why it didn’t succeed.”
Head of Israel’s National Cyber Directorate, Yigal Unna, explained how severe the Iranian attack could have been, stating, “If the bad guys had succeeded in their plot we would now be facing, in the middle of the corona crisis, very big damage to the civilian population and a lack of water and even worse than that.”
The attempt to disrupt the Israeli water system came just prior to an intense heatwave that encompassed the Jewish State. Iran has denied the reports of their involvement.
Israel retaliated to the attack by targeting one of Iran’s significant ports, the Shahid Rajaee Port. While the Iranians have not reported the extent of the damage that was caused, reports state that whatever the damage was that occurred, lines of trucks could be seen as the Iranians sought to make the necessary repairs.
The western official would continue to explain that while, in the end, these exchanges had been minor, it never stops at this. Similar to his warning, Unna also stressed last week that a ‘cyber winter’ is on the horizon.
