Iranian hackers are targeting aviation, oil and gas companies in espionage scheme, researchers say

Source: CNN Politics

Updated May 22, 2026, 9:22 AM ET
PUBLISHED May 22, 2026, 9:06 AM ET


Iranian hackers have posed as job recruiters to target software engineers in the aviation sector as part of an elaborate espionage scheme during the US and Israeli war with Iran, cybersecurity researchers told CNN on Friday. The Iranian operatives also targeted a US oil and gas firm as well organizations in Israel and the United Arab Emirates, according to researchers with US cybersecurity firm Palo Alto Networks’ Unit 42.

Compromising aviation, oil and gas companies could, in theory, allow Iran to do things like track flight manifests to the Middle East or better understand how US oil companies are dealing with a volatile oil market. It’s the kind of asymmetric threat that US intelligence officials have warned about since the US and Israel attacked Iran in late February.

The hacking effort involved fake job postings and video conferencing software infected with malicious code. In one case, they impersonated a US airline. It shows the lengths to which Tehran-linked hackers have gone to collect intelligence that could be useful for the regime’s survival in the face of US and Israeli airstrikes.

Unit 42 researchers told CNN that, based on their data, they do not believe the hackers successfully breached any of the oil, gas or aviation firms targeted. They believe some other targets were breached in the global hacking campaign, but they declined to identify them.

Read more: https://www.cnn.com/2026/05/22/politics/iran-hackers-airlines-oil-gas-companies