http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/iran-aids-syria-in-tracking-opposition-via-electronic-surveillance-us-officials-say/2012/10/09/410a3cae-1224-11e2-a16b-2c110031514a_story.html?wprss=rss_national-security
By Ellen Nakashima, Washington
Post, Wednesday, October 10, 6:09 AM
"Iran is providing crucial equipment and technical help to
Syria in its effort to track opposition forces through the Internet and other
forms of electronic surveillance, according to U.S. officials.
The aid is the latest example of how Iran is helping Syria
in its battle against rebel forces threatening the regime of President Bashar
al-Assad. The technical assistance is coming mainly through Iran’s Ministry of
Intelligence and Security, the officials said.
Iran, which has long experience in tracking dissidents
internally, has supplied surveillance and communications gear, as well as
technical support in computer-network surveillance, said one intelligence
official. Like others interviewed, he spoke on the condition of anonymity because
of the topic’s sensitivity.
Among the tactics in which Iran is advising the Syrians is
how to gain access to Web forums and chat rooms, where they pose as opposition
members to identify and track targets, the intelligence official said. Syrian
agents are then dispatched to kill the rebels, the officials said.
An array of sophisticated techniques used to entrap Syrian
opposition activists has already been unearthed by tech privacy and security
groups. Pro-government hackers have covertly installed spyware on activists’
computers by sending them e-mail and Skype messages purporting to be from
opposition sympathizers that include attachments containing surveillance tools,
said Eva Galperin of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, an Internet privacy
group based in San Francisco.
The surveillance software can record keystrokes, steal
passwords, turn on webcams and record audio conversations.
Iran’s electronic assistance began at least a year ago as
part of a broader program to sustain the Syrian regime that included military
advisers and fighters from Hezbollah, a Lebanese Shiite militant group closely
allied with Iran.
“We know that Iran is there in a whole range of
capabilities, and they’re offering what capabilities they have because they
look at a loss of Syria as a huge problem,” Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Mich.),
chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, said in an
interview. “You can extrapolate from that everything they have available, from
weapons systems to finance and training, and they do have a growing
cyber-capability that’s concerning.”
Instead of weapons, the Obama administration has given the
rebels communications gear, passed on intelligence on who is being targeted,
and trained them in using covert channels to escape tracking by the government.
The intelligence official said advice on how to avoid being
targeted includes “relatively simple techniques that anyone who’s
computer-savvy can use to obscure” their identity.
“It’s a good way for us to help the opposition without
having to send in troops and bombs,” said a former U.S. defense official.
The Syrians are reasonably good at internal security, but
experts say the Iranians are better trained in electronic and computer-network
surveillance.
“Technologically, they’re light-years ahead of Syria,” said
Robert B. Baer, a former CIA case officer in the Middle East and author of
several books on the region. “The Syrians have got to go to the Iranians for
anything advanced.”
James Ball contributed to this report."
