Theresa Payton, First Female White House CIO, Leading Cybersecurity Expert, and 2019 Woman Cybersecurity Leader of the Year, made a speech to the Free Iran 2020 Global Summit: Iran Rising Up for Freedom, at Ashraf 3, Albania, on July 17, 2020.
In parts of her speech, Theresa Payton said:
“The Iranian regime is at the forefront of the actors in cyberwarfare and we must stop it. The current Iranian regime uses a mix of cyber intrusions, digital manipulation campaigns, and terrorist activities or threat of such, as their key strategy for maintaining the regime’s operational status quo and to improve their standing on the world’s stage and suppress their citizenry…
“Iran has been using social media influence operations to discredit the pro-democracy movement, mainly the MEK, to their own citizens for years.
“Case in point, Iran promoted fake news relating to the Iran nuclear deal trying to persuade the world that their nuclear program existed solely for peaceful use and that its military involvements in countries such as Yemen, Iraq, and Syria, were humanitarian…
“We will never find a solution to a free Iran or safety from the regime’s mix of citizen oppression, cyber intrusions, and terrorism without dedicating ourselves to a bold new approach.”
