The Wednesday, April 25, 2012 Washington Times featured an
article “US seen as Iran ‘cyberarmy’ target” (see http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/apr/25/us-seen-as-iran-cyberarmy-target/
which is also the photo source.)
While the picture shows Iranian President Mahmoud
Ahmadinejad, the article quotes Rep Dan Lungrem (CA –R) the chairman of the
cybersecurity, infrastructure protection and security technologies subcommittee as
saying: “if recent reports are accurate that Tehran is investing $1 billion to
expand their cyberwarfare capabilities, Iran
will be a growing cyber threat to our U.S. homeland.”
This is but one front in the multi-pronged engagement
between the West and Iran. Others involve the UN and means include sanctions
and growing calls against Iranian nuclear efforts.
This raises a number of interesting questions. Are the
reports of Iran’s ‘cyberarmy’ true? If so, then how true? Would an adversary
really need to spend $1 Billion to gather the people and resources necessary to
mount a cyber attack? While I have no personal knowledge of what Iran has or
doesn’t have it is reasonable to assume that they have some cyber capability –
how much remains open to question.
However, then can we say for certain the that the media
promotion of their alleged capabilities is a PSYOP success because they really
don’t have very much, or a triumph of investigative reporting because the media
has uncovered this heinous threat against the US?
No comments:
Post a Comment