Iran is formulating strategic cyber defense plan: official

The director of Iran's Passive Defense Organization has said that Iranian experts are preparing a strategic cyber defense plan to help the country counter cyber attacks, Mehr news agency reported.

"In the previous (Iranian calendar) year (ended on March 19), the country's cyber command was established, and (the formulation of) the cyber defense strategy is now on our agenda," Gholam Reza Jalali said on Thursday in an interview with "Iran" radio station when asked about plans to deal with cyber attacks on the country.

"The important point is that we develop mechanisms for cyber defense in a way that we will be able to defend the country against new viruses," he said.

He also said that over the past few years Iran had been the target of numerous cyber attacks, which had been carried out to disrupt the country's industrial systems, but Iranian experts had been able to successfully monitor and counter the threats.

In addition, he said that the focus of the cyber command's activities was on cyber defense and Iran had no plan to launch cyber attacks on other countries.