United with Israel

Israel’s counter cyber strike was a clear Israeli message to Iran, “Don’t you dare touch civilian systems,” said Amos Yadlin, former head of military intelligence.

By Associated Press

Israel’s national cyber chief Thursday officially acknowledged the country had thwarted a major cyber attack last month against its water systems, an assault widely attributed to arch-enemy Iran, calling it a “synchronized and organized attack” aimed at disrupting key national infrastructure.

Yigal Unna did not mention Iran directly, nor did he comment on the alleged Israeli retaliation two weeks later said to have shut down a key Iranian port, but he said recent developments have ushered in a new era of covert warfare, ominously warning that “cyber winter is coming.”

“Rapid is not something that describes enough how fast and how crazy and hectic things are moving forward in cyberspace and I think we will remember this last month and May 2020 as a changing point in the history of modern cyber warfare,” he said in a video address to CyberechLive Asia, a digital international cyber conference.

“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,” he added.

Israel and Iran are bitter foes who have engaged in years of covert battles that have included high-tech hacking and cyber attacks. Most famously, U.S. and Israeli intelligence agencies are suspected of unleashing a computer worm called Stuxnet years ago in an attempt to disrupt Iran’s nuclear program.

Averting a ‘Disastrous Outcome’
But Unna said the attempted hacking into Israel’s water systems marked the first time in modern history that “we can see something like this aiming to cause damage to real life and not to IT or data.”

Had Israel’s National Cyber Directorate not detected the attack in real time, he said chlorine or other chemicals could have been mixed into the water source in the wrong proportions and resulted in a “harmful and disastrous” outcome. His office released a brief statement after the attempt, acknowledged it had been thwarted and no damage had been caused. But Unna’s comments marked the first official detailed account of what happened.

“It is a part of some attack over Israel and over the national security of Israel and not for financial benefit,” he said. “The attack happened but the damage was prevented and that is our goal and our mission. And now we are in the middle of preparing for the next phase to come because it will come eventually.”

Iran hasn’t commented on the attempted hacking and has played down the alleged reprisal on May 9 against the Shahid Rajaee port. Mohammad Rastad, head of Iran’s port and marine agency, told the semiofficial ILNA news agency that the attack failed to infiltrate into the agency’s systems and only damaged “several private sector systems.”

Non-Iranian sources have reported that the damage was far worse than Iran admitted.

Israel has not officially commented on the attack against Iran, but in an interview with Israel’s Army Radio, Amos Yadlin, a former head of military intelligence, said it was significant.

“The attack displayed the cyber ability of a world power. It appears that this was a clear Israeli message to Iran, don’t dare to touch civilian systems, the water and electricity systems in Israel, which were attacked this past month. You, the Iranians, are more vulnerable than we are,” he said.

Without discussing the attack directly, Unna said the past month marked a historic turning point in cyber warfare.

“你不敢攻击平民，”以色列在网络攻击供水系统失败后警告伊朗

前军事情报主管阿莫斯·亚德林（Amos Yadlin）说，以色列的反网络攻击是以色列向伊朗发出的明确信息，“你不敢触碰民用系统”。

美联社

以色列国家网络负责人星期四正式承认，该国上个月挫败了针对其供水系统的一次重大网络攻击，这次攻击被广泛认为是死敌伊朗发动的，他称这是一次旨在破坏国家关键基础设施的“同步和有组织的攻击”。

Yigal Unna没有直接提到伊朗，也没有评论两周后以色列所谓的报复行动，据说已经关闭了伊朗的一个重要港口，但他说，最近的事态发展已经开启了一个秘密战争的新时代，不祥地警告说“网络冬天即将来临”

他在向数字国际网络会议CyberechLive Asia发表的视频讲话中说：“快速并不能充分描述网络空间的发展有多快，有多疯狂和忙碌，我想我们会记住上个月和2020年5月这段时间，这是现代网络战史上的一个转折点。”。

他补充说：“如果坏人成功策划了他们的阴谋，我们现在将面临的，在科罗纳危机的中期，对平民人口的巨大破坏和缺水，甚至更糟。”。

以色列和伊朗是多年的死敌，他们进行了包括高科技黑客和网络攻击在内的秘密战斗。最著名的是，美国和以色列情报机构被怀疑在几年前释放了一种名为Stuxnet的计算机蠕虫病毒，企图破坏伊朗的核计划。

避免“灾难性后果”

但乌纳说，试图侵入以色列供水系统的行为标志着现代史上第一次“我们可以看到这样的事情，目的是对现实生活造成损害，而不是对它或数据造成损害”

他说，如果以色列国家网络局没有实时发现袭击，氯或其他化学物质可能以错误的比例混入水源，造成“有害和灾难性”的后果。他的办公室在这次尝试之后发表了一份简短的声明，承认这一尝试遭到挫败，没有造成任何损失。但Unna的评论标志着官方首次详细描述了发生的事情。

他说：“这是对以色列和以色列国家安全的一些攻击的一部分，不是为了经济利益。”。“袭击发生了，但破坏被阻止了，这是我们的目标和任务。现在我们正在为下一阶段的到来做准备，因为它终将到来。”

伊朗没有对黑客未遂事件发表评论，并淡化了5月9日针对沙希德·拉贾埃港口的报复指控。伊朗港口和海洋局局长穆罕默德·拉斯塔德告诉半官方的伊尔纳通讯社，袭击没有渗透到该局的系统中，只破坏了“几个私营部门系统”

非伊朗消息人士报道说，损失远比伊朗承认的严重。

以色列尚未正式评论对伊朗的袭击，但在接受以色列军方电台采访时，前军事情报负责人阿莫斯·亚德林（Amos Yadlin）说，这一事件意义重大。

“这次攻击显示了一个世界强国的网络能力。看来，这是以色列向伊朗发出的明确信息，不敢触碰以色列在过去一个月遭到袭击的民用系统、水电系统。你，伊朗人，比我们更脆弱。”。

在没有直接讨论攻击的情况下，Unna说，过去一个月标志着网络战争的一个历史性转折点。