Israel reports sharp rise in Iranian cyberattacks amid regional tensions

Israel said hostile cyber incidents tied to Iran jumped sharply in June 2026, reaching about 4,800 cases from roughly 1,600 in June 2025. Yossi Karadi, the director general of Israel’s National Cyber Directorate, said the campaign had widened beyond military systems to organizations, infrastructure-linked networks and civilian services, including law firms and accounting firms. He said, “there is no ceasefire in cyberspace.”

The spike adds a digital front to a confrontation that has already moved through missiles, airstrikes and ceasefires. Israel’s cyber authority said the June incidents targeted systems used by critical infrastructure, central organizations and small and medium-sized companies. Karadi said Israel had so far held off attacks on critical infrastructure, but easier-to-penetrate businesses were often left with their systems wiped, a pattern that shows how cyber pressure can spread through the broader economy even when hardened national targets hold.

The scale of the problem was already visible in 2025. Israel’s National Cyber Directorate said it handled more than 26,000 cyber incidents that year, a 55 percent increase from 2024. The three most targeted sectors were the financial sector, government institutions and digital service providers. During Operation Rising Lion, the directorate said reports to the 119 National Cyber Emergency Center rose 75 percent above the monthly average. Israel launched Operation Rising Lion on June 13, 2025, and the conflict’s cyber layer included phishing, defacements, propaganda and disinformation, according to open-source analyses and Israeli statements.

Karadi has also described Iran’s reach in personal terms. In a public address in December 2025, he said Iran had used cyber weapons to try to target every citizen in Israel multiple times during the 12-day June war. He cited a thwarted attack on Shamir Medical Center as one example of Iranian activity. Those episodes fit a broader pattern in which hospitals, local firms and public-facing services become attractive targets because they are less protected than military systems but still central to daily life.

President Isaac Herzog has said the cyber front is “an active front” that threatens national infrastructure and the lives of every citizen in Israel. Iran typically denies carrying out hacking campaigns even as it reports attacks on itself, leaving attribution contested, but the operational impact is harder to dismiss. The rising incident count suggests the confrontation can keep moving through networks and civilian institutions long after the battlefield quiets.