AP sources: US struck Iranian military computers this week

US military cyber forces launched a strike against Iranian military computer systems on Thursday as President Donald Trump backed away from plans for a more conventional military strike in response to Iran's downing of a US surveillance drone, US officials have said.

Two officials told The Associated Press on Saturday that the strikes were conducted with approval from Trump. A third official confirmed the broad outlines of the strike. All spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly about the operation.

The cyberattacks a contingency plan developed over weeks amid escalating tensions disabled Iranian computer systems that controlled its rocket and missile launchers, the officials said.

Two of the officials said the attacks, which specifically targeted Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps computer system, were provided as options after Iranian forces blew up two oil tankers earlier this month.

The IRGC, which was designated a foreign terrorist group by the Trump administration earlier this year, is a branch of the Iranian military.

The action by US Cyber Command was a demonstration of the US' increasingly mature cyber military capabilities and its more aggressive cyber strategy under the Trump administration. Over the last year US officials have focused on persistently engaging with adversaries in cyberspace and undertaking more offensive operations.

There was no immediate reaction Sunday morning in Iran to the US claims. Iran has hardened and disconnected much of its infrastructure from the internet after the Stuxnet computer virus, widely believed to be a joint US-Israeli creation, disrupted thousands of Iranian centrifuges in the late 2000s.

Tensions have escalated between the two countries ever since the US withdrew last year from the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran and began a policy of "maximum pressure."
The National Security Agency would not discuss Iranian cyber actions specifically, but said in a statement to the AP on Friday that "there have been serious issues with malicious Iranian cyber actions in the past."