Iranian Cyberattacks to destabilise Europe
In an exceptional move, France has attributed cyberattacks on supermarket refrigeration controllers deployed across 700 major retail sites in France to Iran, and specifically to the Iranian group Shahid Kaveh. France indicates that Shahid Kaveh was indeed the perpetrator and that the attack was orchestrated by higher-level Iranian hierarchical structures, based on indicators of compromise subsequently discovered. This group is known to cybersecurity specialists and has a history of attacks on critical infrastructure such as water and industrial systems.
Iran tagging along Russia in Europe
Looking back at the chronology of events, two elements are interesting: 1) the initial claim by Russian groups – as we will see later for the false bomb alerts on airplanes – and 2) a second wave of attacks using a priori the same modus operandi and which for the moment has not been officially attributed.
At the same time as the claim of responsibility by Russian groups, a video posted online via Iranian media outlets showed a masked man threatening Europe with violent reprisals and calling for a popular uprising against American attacks on Iranian territory. At the end, the man unmasked himself, revealing the face of Ibrahim Zolfaghari. He is an officer in the Iranian army and spokesperson for the Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters, the joint operational command of the armed forces of the Islamic Republic of Iran. His existence had been questioned by Israel, which launched a widespread campaign among Iranians claiming that he was an AI-generated avatar.
Russia is therefore no longer the only ultra-aggressive actor targeting Europe. The question arises as to whether the members of the CRINK axis (China – Russia – Iran – North Korea) are cooperating to destabilize Europe or carrying out separate operations.
Leave a Reply