Charming Kitten amid Iranian social unrest examined

Iranian hacking group Charming Kitten, also known as TA453, is not expected to significantly alter its operations amid the ongoing social unrest in Iran but assets secured by the group, which has targeted human rights workers, journalists, diplomats, academics, and government agencies, could be easily leveraged to serve Iran's agenda, according to The Record, a news site by cybersecurity firm Recorded Future. "If these attacks have worked in the past, they already have access into, say, someones email inbox that might be covering this. [Someone] that might have sources on the ground that are part of the demonstrations. The Iranian government, if they've been successful with these attacks against others in the past, they're able to see all that. And of course they will leverage that for their own agenda," said Proofpoint Vice President of Threat Research and Detection Sherrod DeGrippo. DeGrippo also noted that Iran has been incentivizing homegrown ransomware actors, with citizen activists being recruited to cyber espionage group roles.