Iran says Stuxnet is back, claims Israel tried to hack Iranian infrastructure

Is Stuxnet back? Iran”s Telecommunications Minister Mohammad Javad Azari-Jahromi alleges that Israel attempted a cyberattack on Iran”s telecommunications infrastructure through a new version of Stuxnet, so Iran will take the matter to the International Court of Justice, Reuters writes.

Iran claims the malware is very similar to the notorious Stuxnet that was allegedly developed by US and Israeli intelligence and crippled Iran”s nuclear infrastructure more than 10 years ago.

“The Zionist regime, with its record of using cyber weapons such as Stuxnet computer virus, launched a cyberattack on Iran on Monday to harm Iran”s communication infrastructures,” said Mohammad Javad Azari-Jahromi.

“Thanks to our vigilant technical teams, it failed,” he tweeted.

Gholamreza Jalali, the head of the civil defense agency, said in an interview with the Iranian Students News Agency (ISNA) that Iran “recently discovered a new generation of Stuxnet which consisted of several parts … and was trying to enter our systems.”

According to the Times of Israel, Israeli TV station Hadashot said on Wednesday that Iranian strategic networks had been hacked. The news came after Israel said it foiled an Iranian murder plot in Denmark and the alleged phone tapping of Iranian President Hassan Rouhani.

Iran “has admitted in the past few days that it is again facing a similar attack, from a more violent, more advanced and more sophisticated virus than before, that has hit infrastructure and strategic networks” but they are “not admitting, of course, how much damage has been caused,” said the news report.

Israel has not released an official statement on the accusations.