Iran’s state railway hit by cyber attack, chaos at stations across the country

According to the Fars news agency in Iran, on July 9, 2021, local time, the Iranian railway system was hit by a cyber attack, with attackers posting false information about train delays or cancellations on displays at stations across the country.

Attackers flooded displays at stations across the country with false information about train delays or cancellations. A notification on the display mentioned that the train had been “delayed” or “cancelled” for extended periods due to the cyber attack and urged passengers to call for more details. What remains here is precisely the landline number (64411) of the office of the supreme leader of Iran, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

The Iranian National Railway suffered a cyber attack. The attackers posted false information about the delay or cancellation of trains on the display screens of the stations around the country;

In recent years, Iran has repeatedly suffered damage to its network infrastructure, highlighting the weakness of cyberspace’s ability to counteract risks of Xiaguan infrastructure.

A cyber attack has caused “unprecedented chaos” at an Iranian train station. However, the Fars News Agency said that the attack did not cause any interruption of transportation capacity, and hoped to minimize the impact of the incident.

ABC News reported that “Fars later deleted the story, citing an explanation from National Railways spokesman Thad Sekri that the ‘disruption’ had not had any impact on train service. ”

At the time of this article’s publication, it was still unclear who was behind the attack, and no gang had claimed responsibility for the incident. But Iran is rebuilding a security backup system to minimize the loss of the attack.

But the current troubles with Iran’s rail system don’t stop there. Earlier the same day, electronic tracking systems for trains across Iran suddenly broke out. It is unclear whether the two are related.

On July 10, local time, Iranian state television reported that the internal computer system of the Iranian Ministry of Roads and Urban Development was hit by a cyber attack on the 10th, causing the ministry’s website and other websites to be disrupted. The report did not say whether the suspects and the hackers demanded a ransom.

Fragile gateway infrastructure under cyberspace confrontation

Iran’s critical infrastructure has been plagued by disasters in recent years, and various nation-state hacker groups have repeatedly attacked it.

In October 2020, Iranian cybersecurity authorities revealed that two government departments were affected by cyberattacks.

In December 2019, Iran’s telecommunications minister announced twice within a week that cyberattacks on domestic infrastructure had been thwarted.

Mohammad Jahami, Iran’s Minister of Communications and Information Technology, confirmed that the attack had been neutralized by the state’s cyber-blocking mechanism, adding that the attack came from the APT27 gang, which was meant to gather state intelligence on Iran’s side.

In October 2019, Western countries accused Iran of carrying out physical and cyber attacks on its infrastructure and multiple Middle Eastern countries, and Iran fears that Western countries are likely to retaliate.

At the time, Iran’s oil ministry also said that Washington’s government had launched an all-out economic war against Iran in retaliation for the downing of a U.S. drone and attacks on oil tankers.

Iran said late last year that two government agencies had been hit by massive cyberattacks, but did not name those behind it. Iran has in the past named the United States and Israel for cyberattacks.

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