The second edition of HackerWatch report covers the latest developments in Iran’s cyber orbit. Yet the report is overshadowed by the “Woman, Life, Freedom” movement, sparked by the tragic death of a young Kurdish woman in police custody in September 2022. These protests happened against a backdrop of expansive surveillance and geopolitical competition between Iran and Israel. As a result, the report focuses on two key themes:
First, it provides an overview of Iran’s cyber capabilities that facilitate targeting of dissidents and attacking networks of Iran’s adversaries. In particular, the report focuses on Iran’s surveillance apparatus developed in collaboration with private entities, based on new revelations from media reports and hacktivist personas.
Second, HackerWatch reviews Iran’s cyber vulnerabilities as indicated by a series of ostensibly organic hacktivist attacks on the networks of state and its affiliated organizations.
The resulting image suggests Iran’s increased risk tolerance in targeting adversaries in the name of national security and, at the same time, deprioritizing resources for securing national networks, which undermines the collective sense of security for Iranian citizens.
