The US Department of Justice has unsealed charges against seven Iranian hackers with disrupting computer systems at American banks and a small dam north of NY between 2011 and 2013, accusing the men of working on behalf of the Iranian government.
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Justice officials said the attacks cut off hundreds of thousands of customers from their bank accounts and they suspect the hackers – who the government says worked for Iranian tech companies – conducted the attacks with the consent and knowledge of Iran’s powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
Beginning in 2011, and escalating to a “near weekly” frequency in 2012 and 2013, the hackers targeted 46 institutions on at least 176 days, including Bank of America, the New York Stock Exchange, American Express, JPMorgan Chase and Citibank, according to the charges.
“These attacks were relentless, systemic, and widespread”, said Attorney General Loretta Lynch, noting that the outcome “could have posed a clear danger to the public health and safety of Americans”.
The indictment comes less than a year after a nuclear deal was signed between Iran, the USA and world powers.
The Department of Justice identified the seven hackers as Ahmad Fathi, 37; Hamid Firoozi, 34; Amin Shokohi, 25; Sadegh Ahmadzadegan, 23; Omid Ghaffarinia, 25; Sina Keissar 25, and Nader Saedi, 26. A stroke of good fortune prevented the hackers from obtaining operational control of the flood gates because the dam had been manually disconnected for routine maintenance, she said.
“The threat to our infrastructure, like Bowman Dam”, said Attorney General Loretta Lynch at a press conference in Washington, “is definitely of concern to us”.
The indictment apparently links the Iranian government to the attacks. In recent years, cyber-attacks like these from Iran have been less common, U.S. officials said.
“The world is small, and our memories are long”, he said.
The U.S.in 2014 charged five members of China’s People’s Liberation Army for allegedly stealing trade secrets and communications from U.S. companies, but none of them have faced an American court.
According to the Wall Street Journal, Firoozi used a cellular modem to access the control systems at the 20-foot Bowman Avenue dam in Rye. The story enraged U.S. senator Chuck Schumer, an influential Democrat from NY, sources said.
Lynch announced the charges as a 17-page, three-count indictment from a NY grand jury was unsealed.
“These are no ordinary crimes, but calculated attacks by groups with ties to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard and designed specifically to harm America and its people, ” Bharara said, adding that the Bowman Dam intrusion represented a “frightening new frontier in cybercrime”.
Speaking at a cyber security conference earlier this month, National Security Agency chief Michael Rogers said it was a matter of “when, not if” another country launched a successful and destructive cyber attack on United States critical infrastructure like the one seen in Ukraine. We never say never. “We want them looking over their shoulder”.
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“We know very well that [China is] going to spy on our military, just as we spy on theirs, but [the indictment] was meant to have a deterrent effect and let them know that we’re losing patience”, he told “Squawk on the Street”.
