Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps
Iran’s cyberwar on American banks extends the IRGC page from sanctions and crypto laundering into Iran-Linked Cyber Operations. In that episode, Rafe Pilling of Sophos identifies the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and the Ministry of Intelligence and Security as two main sponsors of cyber operations emanating from Iran.
The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps appears in Crypto’s big growth on the books and in the shadows through Ari Redbord’s example of two Iran-based cryptocurrency exchanges allegedly used to launder illicit proceeds and evade sanctions. The episode says the [[USTreasury|U.S. Treasury]] later sanctioned those exchanges and a connected financial facilitator.
In the wiki, the organization connects the Iran branch to both Stablecoin Sanctions Evasion and cyber operations. The crypto source uses the case to argue for targeted enforcement against illicit actors rather than suppressing lawful crypto use, while the cybersecurity source links the IRGC to DDoS, phishing, data theft, leak campaigns, and industrial-control risk.
Connections
- Iran - country context.
- Ministry of Intelligence and Security - paired Iranian sponsor named in the cyber episode.
- Iran-Linked Cyber Operations, Banking DDoS Resilience, Cyber Data Theft and Leak Operations, and Industrial Control System Cyber Risk - cyber-operation branch.
- [[USTreasury|U.S. Treasury]] - sanctions actor in the episode.
- Stablecoin Sanctions Evasion, Virtual Asset AML Risk, and Anti-Money Laundering - compliance and sanctions-evasion frame.
- TRM Labs and Ari Redbord - report source and episode expert.