Operation Ababil was a series of cyber attacks starting in 2012, targeting various American financial institutions and carried out by a group calling itself the "Cyber fighters of Izz Ad-Din Al Qassam".
The cyber attacks, or more specifically denial of service attacks, were launched by the Cyber fighters of Izz Ad-Din Al Qassam also known as Qassam Cyber Fighters. The group announced [1] the attacks on September 18, 2012 on Pastebin where they criticized Israel and the United States and justified the attacks as a response to the Innocence of Muslims video released by controversial American pastor Terry Jones. Their targets included the New York Stock Exchange as well as a number of banks including J.P. Morgan Chase. [2] The result of the attacks was a limited disruption of the targeted websites. The attacks ended on Oct 23, 2012 because of the Eid al-Adha holiday [3] at which point they offered to speak to the media through e-mail.
The group’s moniker, Izz ad-Din al-Qassam, was a Muslim preacher who lead in the fight against British, French and Jewish nationalist organizations in the Levant in the 1920s and 1930s.
On September 21, 2012, the Washington Post reported [4] that the attacks originated not from a hacktivist group but from the government of Iran and cited U.S. Senator Joseph I. Lieberman as one who was a proponent of this idea. Lieberman told C-Span that he believed the Iranian government was sponsoring the group's attacks on US banks in retaliation for Western economic sanctions. [5] An early report by Dancho Danchev found the amateurish "outdated and virtually irrelevant technical skills" of the attack suspicious. [6] But Michael Smith, senior security evangelist at Akamai, found the size of the attacks—65 gigabits of traffic per second—more consistent with a state actor (such as Iran) than with a typical hacktivist denial of service attack which would be less than 2 gigabits/second. [7]
The controversial hacktivist, The Jester, claimed the Qassam Cyber Fighters had help with their attacks from the hacking group Anonymous. [8]
On December 10, 2012, the Qassam Cyber Fighters announced [9] the launching of phase two of Operation Ababil. In that statement, they specifically named U.S. Bancorp, J.P. Morgan Chase, Bank of America, PNC Financial Services and SunTrust Bank as targets and identified events such as Hurricane Sandy and the 2012 US Presidential Election as reasons for the delay of phase two. This announcement also mentioned disrespect towards the Prophet Mohammed as motivation and denied the involvement of any nation state. It was during this time that media attention increased with one journalist observing, [10] "Operation Ababil stands out for its sophistication and focus, experts say." and allegations of involvement by Iran also increased. [11] On January 29, 2013, an announcement [12] was made that phase two would come to a conclusion due to the removal of the main copy of the video from YouTube. The announcement also identified additional copies of the movie also hosted on YouTube.
On February 12, 2013, the Qassam Cyber Fighters issued a warning [13] that the other copies of the movie referenced in their January 29 posting should be removed. They followed this with a "serious warning" [14] and then an "ultimatum" [15] after the additional copies of the video were not removed. On March 5, 2013, they announced [16] the beginning of Phase 3 of Operation Ababil on their Pastebin page. This was followed by several of the financial institutions on their target list reporting website disruptions. [17]
Internet activism, hacktivism, or hactivism, is the use of computer-based techniques such as hacking as a form of civil disobedience to promote a political agenda or social change. With roots in hacker culture and hacker ethics, its ends are often related to free speech, human rights, or freedom of information movements.
The Qassam rocket is a simple, steel artillery rocket developed and deployed by the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, the military arm of Hamas. These rockets cannot be fired to target specific military objectives in or near civilian areas, and are "indiscriminate when used against targets in population centers".
Izz ad-Din Abd al-Qadar ibn Mustafa ibn Yusuf ibn Muhammad al-Qassam was a Syrian Muslim preacher, and a leader in the Arab nationalist struggles against British and French Mandatory rule in the Levant, and a militant opponent of Zionism in the 1920s and 1930s.
The Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, named after Izz ad-Din al-Qassam, is the military wing of the Palestinian organization Hamas. Currently led by Mohammed Deif and his deputy, Marwan Issa, IQB is the largest and best-equipped militant group operating within Gaza today.
Salah Mustafa Muhammad Shehade صلاح شحادة was a member of the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas. He led the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades military wing of Hamas, until his assassination by Israel.
Nidal Fat’hi Rabah Farahat created the Qassam rocket, a homemade weapon produced by Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades.
Wa'el Nassar (1973–2004) was an active member and one of the senior leaders of the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas, until his assassination by Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) on 30 May 2004 in Gaza City.
The Black Hand was an anti-Zionist and anti-British Jihadist militant organization in Mandatory Palestine.
The Russian Business Network is a multi-faceted cybercrime organization, specializing in and in some cases monopolizing personal identity theft for resale. It is the originator of MPack and an alleged operator of the now defunct Storm botnet.
Anonymous is a decentralized international activist and hacktivist collective and movement primarily known for its various cyberattacks against several governments, government institutions and government agencies, corporations and the Church of Scientology.
During the Russo-Georgian War, a series of cyberattacks swamped and disabled websites of numerous South Ossetian, Georgian, Russian and Azerbaijani organisations. The attacks were initiated three weeks before the shooting war began.
Cyberwarfare is the use of computer technology to disrupt the activities of a state or organization, especially the deliberate attacking of information systems for strategic or military purposes. As a major developed economy, the United States is highly dependent on the Internet and therefore greatly exposed to cyber attacks. At the same time, the United States has substantial capabilities in both defense and power projection thanks to comparatively advanced technology and a large military budget. Cyber warfare presents a growing threat to physical systems and infrastructures that are linked to the internet. Malicious hacking from domestic or foreign enemies remains a constant threat to the United States. In response to these growing threats, the United States has developed significant cyber capabilities.
Anonymous is a decentralized virtual community. They are commonly referred to as an internet-based collective of hacktivists whose goals, like its organization, are decentralized. Anonymous seeks mass awareness and revolution against what the organization perceives as corrupt entities, while attempting to maintain anonymity. Anonymous has had a hacktivist impact. This is a timeline of activities reported to be carried out by the group.
NullCrew was a hacktivist group founded in 2012 that took responsibility for multiple high-profile computer attacks against corporations, educational institutions, and government agencies.
CyberBerkut is a modern organized group of pro-Russian hacktivists. The group became locally known for a series of publicity stunts and distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks on Ukrainian government, and western or Ukrainian corporate websites. By 2018, this group was accused by western intelligence agencies, such as National Cyber Security Centre of being linked to the GRU, providing plausible deniability.
Cyberwarfare is a part of Iran's "soft war" military strategy. Being both a victim and wager of cyberwarfare, Iran is considered an emerging military power in the field.
Abu Obaida, also spelled Abu Obayda, Abu Ubayda and Abu Ubaydah, is the nom de guerre of a Palestinian militant who is the spokeperson for the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of the Islamist Palestinian political and military organization Hamas.
Ahmed Ghandour, also known as Abu Anas al-Ghandour, was a Palestinian senior militant in the Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas. As commander of the Northern Gaza Brigade, he was a member of the Al-Qassam Brigades' General Military Council and was considered to be a close confidant of Hamas military commander Muhammad Deif. In 2017, Ghandour was designated by the United States as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist. In November 2023, he was killed by an Israeli airstrike amid the Israel–Hamas war.