Albania has been targeted by a new cyberattack that hit its police, its interior ministry said on Saturday (September 10th). The latter again accused Tehran, three days after Tirana’s decision to sever diplomatic relations with Iran, already held responsible for a first cyberattack in July.
“The National Police’s computer systems were hit on Friday by a cyberattack which, according to initial information, was carried out by the same actors who attacked the country’s public services and government systems in July”, we read in the press release. Authorities shut down computer control systems at seaports, airports and border crossings “in order to neutralize the criminal act and secure the systems”.
“Systems will be out of service until the risk is fully eliminated”, added the ministry, which specified that the control of the passengers was done manually. In a tweetPrime Minister Edi Rama denounced “another cyberattack [commise par les] same aggressors already condemned by friendly countries and allies of Albania”.
Iran accuses the US government
After the announcement by Tirana, on September 7, that a massive cyberattack had been orchestrated in July by Iran against the digital infrastructures of the Albanian government, the United States announced on Friday new sanctions against Tehran, targeting in particular the Iranian intelligence ministry. “We will not tolerate Iran’s increasingly aggressive cyber activities that target the United States and its allies and partners”Treasury Undersecretary Brian Nelson said in a statement.
Iran has strongly condemned these US sanctions, calling the accusations“unfounded” and breaking of relations by action Tirana “misguided and thoughtless”. “America’s immediate support for the false accusation of the Albanian government (…) shows that the designer of this scenario is not Albania, but the American government”Iranian Intelligence Ministry spokesman Nasser Kanani said in a statement.
Albania declared on Wednesday that it had suffered a “heavy cyberattack against government digital infrastructure aimed at destroying it”but who ” failed “. In the process, his government had given twenty-four hours to the diplomatic, technical, administrative and security staff of the Iranian embassy to leave.
NATO, for its part, condemned “malicious acts that aim to destabilize an ally and disrupt the daily lives of its citizens”promising to help Albania prepare for possible similar attacks in the future.
Support for the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran
Mr. Kanani also criticized the United States for having “given their full support to a terrorist sect”, alluding to the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI), an exile movement banned in Iran. Since 2013, Albania has welcomed on its soil, at the request of the United States and the UN, members of this movement made up of fierce opponents of the Iranian regime.
The PMOI regularly organizes summits in a city it built not far from Tirana and which regularly hosts several thousand people. But this year, the meeting scheduled for July had been postponed by the PMOI ” For safety reasons “ and “on the recommendation of the Albanian government (…) due to terrorist threats and conspiracies”.
The PMOI supported Ayatollah Khomeini during the 1979 revolution, which overthrew the Shah of Iran. The group had, however, been declared an outlaw by Tehran in 1981, the year it was accused of a bomb attack that killed seventy-four people, including the number two of the regime. The PMOI has never claimed responsibility for this attack, unlike others.