The head of the National Security Agency was in Israel last week to discuss cooperation on cybersecurity, just as both countries seem to be preparing for a surge in cyberattacks out of Iran.
Adm. Mike Rogers was there as a guest of the commander of Israel’s Unit 8200, according to a senior Israeli official who spoke with Tel Aviv’s Haaretz newspaper. Unit 8200 is the intelligence unit that worked with the NSA to create the Stuxnet worm that for years ravaged Iranian uranium enrichment facilities and impeded the country’s nuclear development.
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According to an internal NSA memorandum leaked by former contractor and whistleblower Edward Snowden, the agency also works with Unit 8200 on intelligence interception, language, analysis and reporting.
Though Rogers reportedly met with a range of Israeli intelligence officials, interest centered on mutual defense against Iran and Hezbollah, the terrorist group that serves as Iran’s proxy in Lebanon.
Iran has engaged in a range of cyberattacks over the years, comprised largely of acts of sabotage against U.S. financial institutions including Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase and Citigroup. There was a lull in activity last year during negotiations over the country’s nuclear regime. However, with the negotiations over, officials have said that attacks this year could surge to new levels.
“In 2015, all the actors were trying to behave well, be good boys, because the global political system was very concentrated on the efforts to reach an arrangement regarding the Iranian issue,” Israeli Major Gen. Uzi Moskovitz said in January. “I think that some of the players in the cyberkinetic arena — this is my opinion — have decided to take their gloves off.”
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The U.S. appears to agree. In just the second action of its kind in history, the Justice Department last week unveiled indictments against seven Iranian hackers linked to attacks on financial institutions and a separate incident involving a dam in New York. The first time the department went after foreign hackers was in 2014, when it indicted five Chinese hackers for trying to steal commercial military secrets.
