Donate Us

Help us keep this free site alive with a small contribution from you. Select an amount below.

Sunday, September 23, 2012

From YNet:
Iranian troops uncovered a monitoring device disguised as a rock near the underground nuclear enrichment plant at Fordo, according to western intelligence sources.

The Sunday Times quoted the sources as saying that the fake rock exploded when Revolutionary Guards who were on a patrol last month to check terminals connecting data and telephone links at Fordo tried to move it.

According to the British newspaper, Iranian experts who examined the scene of the blast found the remains of a device capable of intercepting data from computers at the nuclear plant, where uranium is being enriched in centrifuges.

The Sunday Times said it is feared a significant source of intelligence may have been lost for the West, which believes Iran could be preparing to use enriched uranium to make a nuclear bomb.

The report said the Iranians initially kept news of the explosion secret. But last week Fereydoun Abbasi, the country's vice president and head of its nuclear energy agency, revealed that power lines between Qom and the Fordo plant had been blown up on August 17.

Early reports suggested the explosion was meant to cut power supplies to the plant and damage the centrifuges. However, inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), who visited Fordo the day after the explosion, made no mention of any damage or disruption in their report.

The Sunday Times said intercepting the computer and phone lines from the plant would have enabled western analysts to estimate the output from the centrifuges.
Israel has been suspected of using similar booby-trapped devices to intercept voice and data transmissions from Hezbollah in Lebanon.

This report seems more plausible than the idea that the West would arbitrarily send a message to Iran by noisily destroying power lines that could be easily replaced. However, the initial reports said that power lines to Natanz were also destroyed in a separate explosion.

Were power lines also being monitored? I can imagine that Western intelligence can estimate the number of centrifuges being placed on line by watching how much power is being used incrementally at Fordo.

All of this is guesswork, of course, as no one is going to tell the full truth. Perhaps this alleged device was a critical piece in harvesting intelligence at Fordo. But for all we know there is a huge infrastructure of dozens or thousands of similar spy and sabotage devices sprinkled around Iranian nuclear facilities and Iran itself.



--
Posted By Elder of Ziyon to Elder of Ziyon at 9/23/2012 05:45:00 AM

0 comments:

Post a Comment

EoZTV Podcast

Powered by Blogger.

follow me

search eoz

Recent posts from other blogs

subscribe via email

comments

Contact

translate

E-Book

source materials

reference sites

multimedia

source materials for Jewish learning

great places to give money

media watch

humor

.

Source materials

Sample Text

EoZ's Most Popular Posts Ever

follow me

Followers


pages

Random Posts

Pages - Menu

Elder of Ziyon - حـكـيـم صـهـيـون

Donate!

Tweets

Compliments

Monthly subscription:
Subscription options

One time donation:

Interesting Blogs

Categories

Best posts of 2016

Blog Archive

compliments

Algemeiner: "Fiercely intelligent and erudite"

Omri: "Elder is one of the best established and most respected members of the jblogosphere..."
Atheist Jew:"Elder of Ziyon probably had the greatest impression on me..."
Soccer Dad: "He undertakes the important task of making sure that his readers learn from history."
AbbaGav: "A truly exceptional blog..."
Judeopundit: "[A] venerable blog-pioneer and beloved patriarchal figure...his blog is indispensable."
Oleh Musings: "The most comprehensive Zionist blog I have seen."
Carl in Jerusalem: "...probably the most under-recognized blog in the JBlogsphere as far as I am concerned."
Aussie Dave: "King of the auto-translation."
The Israel Situation:The Elder manages to write so many great, investigative posts that I am often looking to him for important news on the PalArab (his term for Palestinian Arab) side of things."
Tikun Olam: "Either you are carelessly ignorant or a willful liar and distorter of the truth. Either way, it makes you one mean SOB."
Mondoweiss commenter: "For virulent pro-Zionism (and plain straightforward lies of course) there is nothing much to beat it."
Didi Remez: "Leading wingnut"