At an army base outside Tel Aviv, soldiers sit in front of screens glued to scrolling colored computer code, keyboards at the ready to deflect attacks.
They’re Israel’s cyber defense team in training, among the uniformed men and women learning how to stalk hackers and pounce on virtual enemies as the state shields everything from ministry websites to the systems running the Tel Aviv stock market.
“To become one of the leading countries in cyber security, we have to act quickly to ensure that everyone will understand Israel is on its way to becoming a leading cyber-nation,” Rami Efrati, head of the civilian division of the National Cyber Bureau, said in an interview at the year-old agency this month. “Cyber security can be a national growth engine.”
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who expects to be tapped to form Israel’s next ruling coalition later this week, has been channeling resources to the intensifying subterranean war through fiber optic cables between Israel and its enemies.
The Israeli leader has repeatedly pointed to Iran and its allies, warning of the threat of cyber-attacks last month. Iran in turn accused Israel and the U.S. of trying to sabotage its nuclear program in 2011, while last year a virus wreaked havoc with Iranian computer systems.
“Cyber has three dimensions: intelligence, defense and offense,” said Amos Yadlin, the former military intelligence chief who now heads the Institute for National Security Studies at Tel Aviv University. “Anyone who deals with any one of the dimensions must understand the other two. You can’t defend if you don’t know how to attack.”
Most Attacked
Israeli government networks are among the most highly attacked in the world, with daily assaults numbering in the tens of thousands, the Soufan Group, a New York-based security adviser, said in a Jan. 14 report.
Two months ago, civilian computer technicians sat in front of a bank of screens in a Jerusalem government building deflecting millions of attempted attacks on Israeli government websites as the country’s air force struck the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip and rockets hit Israel’s towns and cities.
Palestinian militants in Gaza consider cyber part of their resistance to Israel. “Our professional hackers never sleep,” said the spokesman for a pro-Hamas group who goes by the name Abu Mujahid. Islamic Jihad, which like Hamas is considered a terrorist organization by Israel, the U.S. and the European Union, said in November its operatives hacked into 5,000 mobile phones belonging to senior Israeli army officers.
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