Shin Bet exposes over 200 Iranian cyber phishing attempts against senior Israeli officials, aimed at enabling future attacks on them

The Shin Bet security service says it identified more than 200 Iranian phishing attempts against senior Israeli officials in a bid to secure their personal details.

Among those targeted were senior security and political officials, academics and media personalities, the Shin Bet says.

The hackers tried to get the Israelis to download an app that would then share their personal details, in some cases so that they could later be targeted in attacks.

The Shin Bet says the targets were approached with individually crafted cover stories so as not to raise their suspicions. In one example shown by the Shin Bet, the hacker posed as Cabinet Secretary Yossi Fuchs and told the target he was trying to coordinate a meeting with him and the prime minister.

The Shin Bet says that it had identified and briefed those targeted by the campaign.