Two congressmen urged financial regulators to strengthen defenses against possible cyberattacks from Iran, in the wake of recent threats against the United States from the regime.
“In response to the heightened and credible threats as articulated by U.S. national security elements, we urge financial regulators to strengthen their existing financial infrastructure against potential cyber-attacks,” Reps. Emanuel Cleaver (D-Mo.) and Gregory Meeks (D-N.Y.), both members of the House Financial Services Committee, wrote in a letter (pdf) to Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin.
“We urge you, our nation’s financial regulators, to work in coordination with law enforcement and regulated entities to increase sharing of appropriate cyber threat information,” Cleaver and Meeks wrote in the Jan. 7 letter. “We request that your institutions communicate a strategy to further mitigate existing cyber vulnerabilities within our financial institutions by March 2020.”
The congressmen cited past Iranian cyberattacks such as in 2012, when the regime targeted U.S. financial institutions—including Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, and Wells Fargo—with denial of service attacks, causing the banks’ systems to get overwhelmed with internet traffic requests. Iran also destroyed company data at Pennsylvania-based Sands Casino in 2014, the letter noted.
“Iran has proven to be exceptionally capable when it comes to cyber-warfare,” Cleaver, who chairs the House Financial Services Committee’s subcommittee on national security, said in a separate statement on Wednesday. “As tensions with the Iranian regime continue to unnecessarily escalate, it’s critical that financial regulators and individual institutions be proactive in preparation for potential cyber-attacks against our financial system.”
The letter was also sent to the Federal Reserve, Securities and Exchange Commission, Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, Federal Housing Finance Agency, Commodity Futures Trading Commission, National Credit Union Administration, and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency.
The letter comes after Department of Homeland Security acting Secretary Chad Wolf issued a new National Terrorism Advisory System bulletin on Jan. 4, a day after a U.S. airstrike killed Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani.
Wolf said that the department doesn’t have information about any “specific, credible threat” to the United States at this time but said that “previous homeland-based plots have included, among other things, scouting and planning against infrastructure targets and cyber enabled attacks against a range of U.S.- based targets.”
He added, “Iran maintains a robust cyber program and can execute cyber attacks against the United States. Iran is capable, at a minimum, of carrying out attacks with temporary disruptive effects against critical infrastructure in the United States.”
Epoch Times reporter Katabella Roberts contributed to this report.
