WorldNetDaily.com reports: “Iran is planning to retaliate against the United States for the sabotage against its nuclear program, according to an editorial in the Kayhan newspaper, the mouthpiece of Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

The U.S. has all of its infrastructure connected to the Internet, the editorial says, and as a result, “it is constantly worried about an unknown player, who they will never be able to identify … sitting in some corner of the world who would launch an attack on a sector of (the Americans’) foundations. They will be taught the mother of all lessons.”

Specifically, Iran is looking into launching a cyber attack against U.S. electrical grid systems'” (This report if and when it can be fulfilled would be catastrophic. Darkness would inundate our land. Electrically run America or any other nation attacked would be totally paralyzed as computers are cyber-attacked and a nation becomes totally confused and hopelessly helpless ‘ “And in that day they shall roar against them like the roaring of the sea: and if one look unto the land, behold darkness and sorrow‘” ‘ Isaiah 5:30.)

Fox News reports: “Top U.S. cyber cops were surprised by revelations of an unprecedented case of cyber-espionage — a five-year-long hacking scheme from a single ‘state actor’ that targeted U.S. government and U.N. computers as well as defense firms and private industries.

The spying was dubbed ‘Operation Shady RAT’ by security firm McAfee, which uncovered the hacking — and it led to a massive loss of information that poses a huge economic threat, security experts say.

‘Even we were surprised by the enormous diversity of the victim organizations and were taken aback by the audacity of the perpetrators,’ wrote McAfee’s vice president of threat research, Dmitri Alperovitch’

Col. Rivers Johnson, the spokesman for U.S. Cyber Command at Fort Meade, told FoxNews.com the agency was doing it all it can to protect the country from cyber-attacks.

‘We have an active defense system in place to hunt within DoD networks and prevent infiltration. We are using all appropriate means right now as part of that active defense.’

Indeed, the agency is prepared to expand its efforts if needed, Johnson said.

‘We could be called upon to assist others if the President so directs,’ he told FoxNews.com” (II Timothy 3:1 “This know also, that in the last days perilous [dangerous] times shall come.” Why? Verse 3 of the text: “traitors“.)

Reuters reports: “Security experts have discovered an unprecedented series of cyber-attacks on the networks of 72 organizations globally, including the United Nations, governments and corporations, over a five-year period.

Security company McAfee, which uncovered the intrusions, said it believed there was one ‘state actor’ behind the attacks but declined to name it, though several other security experts said the evidence points to China.

The long list of victims in the extended campaign include the governments of the United States, Taiwan, India, South Korea, Vietnam and Canada; the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN); the International Olympic Committee (IOC); the World Anti-Doping Agency; and an array of companies, from defense contractors to high-tech enterprises’

McAfee learned of the extent of the hacking campaign in March this year, when its researchers discovered logs of the attacks while reviewing the contents of a ‘command and control’ server that they had discovered in 2009 as part of an investigation into security breaches at defense companies.

It dubbed the attacks ‘Operation Shady RAT’ and said the earliest breaches date back to mid-2006, though there might have been other intrusions. (RAT stands for ‘remote access tool,’ a type of software that hackers and security experts use to access computer networks from afar)’

Jim Lewis, a cyber-expert with the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said it was very likely China was behind the campaign because some of the targets had information that would be of particular interest to Beijing.

The systems of the IOC and several national Olympic Committees were breached before the 2008 Beijing Games. And China views Taiwan as a renegade province, and political issues between them remain contentious even as economic ties have strengthened in recent years.

‘Everything points to China. It could be the Russians, but there is more that points to China than Russia,’ Lewis said'” (Luke 21:25 ‘ the world scene could soon experience the fulfillment of this prophecy “‘nations will be in distress with perplexity [mass confusion].”)

The Christian Science Monitor reports: “Lawmakers on Capitol Hill have delivered a stark warning to the Pentagon: its failure to address key questions surrounding how the United States military would respond to a cyber-attack ‘ and what precisely constitutes an act of war in cyberspace, for that matter ‘ remains a ‘significant gap’ in US national security policy.

Senior Pentagon officials for their part are griping, too, that the current Defense Department approach to cyber warfare is ‘way too predictable.’ Gen. James Cartwright, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, recently lamented that, in cyberspace, ‘there is no penalty for attacking [the US] right now. We’ve got to figure out a way to change that.’

To that end, some senior defense officials are increasingly pushing for the US to retaliate against cyber-sieges with counterstrikes ‘ that could ultimately include launching a ‘land-based attack’ on the perpetrator.

These signs point to a growing challenge within the Pentagon to the assumption that what happens in cyberspace stays in cyberspace, say analysts.

An armed counterstrike to a cyber-attack ‘sounds so provocative,’ says Kristin Lord, director of studies at the Center for a New American Security (CNAS).

But it may also be stabilizing, she argues. ‘What the Pentagon and White House are trying to do is say that, in a circumstance when we have been attacked in a way that inflicts damage equivalent to an armed attack, we reserve the right to respond in kind,’ explains Dr. Lord, who has co-authored a recent CNAS report on ‘America’s Cyber Future.’

The Pentagon’s new strategy should focus on threatening retaliation, rather than improving defense against cyber-incursions, Cartwright said in remarks at a Defense Writers Group breakfast on July 14. The current approach is ‘way too predictable. It’s purely defensive.’

While the strategy now focuses on defending networks, Cartwright says the next phase must deliver a message ‘to the attacker, ‘If you do this, the price to you is going to go up.’ ”” (Daniel 12:1 “There shall be time of trouble such as never was.” See also Matthew 24:21.)