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Has Iran-Saudi cyberwar already started?

After an Iranian website was hacked, some Iranian websites are speculating as to whether or not an Iranian-Saudi cyberwar has begun.
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Numerous Iranian media outlets reported May 25 that the website The Statistical Center of Iran was hacked and temporarily put out of use. News agencies wrote that the hackers were “outside of Iran” but little else was known about them. Some websites speculated that either the Islamic State (IS) or Iran’s regional rival Saudi Arabia conducted the attack. The low-level attack, which was followed by two attacks on Saudi Arabian statistical websites May 26, raised the question in Iranian media whether Saudi-Iranian cyberwars have begun.

In an articled headlined “The announcement of a cyberwar by Saudi Arabia against Iran?” Tabnak News agency wrote, “While many websites assumed this website was hacked by [IS] … it appears it is a Saudi hacker group.” Tabnak rejected the idea of IS involvement because the hackers referred to themselves as “Da۳s,” as in “Daesh,” an acronym the terrorist group does not use for itself. A Twitter account associated with Da۳s hackers followed a few well-known Saudi accounts, and Tabnak concluded that a Saudi group had conducted the attack with government backing. In any case, the screenshots provided of the hacked website appear to show that the hackers either wanted Iran to know that they were Saudi or that they intended to make it appear that they were.

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