by Ayomide Otitoju
A major cyberattack during the 12-day Iran-Israel conflict has disrupted banking operations at two of Iran’s largest financial institutions—Sepah and Pasargad Banks—wiping out critical data and halting services nationwide.
Hamidreza Amouzegar, Deputy Head of Product Development at Dotin, a banking software firm, disclosed the June 17 breach in a LinkedIn post. “Nothing was accessible. Nothing was visible,” he wrote, describing the collapse of Sepah Bank’s main data center and disaster recovery system.
The attack left internet and mobile banking, as well as ATM services, largely inoperable for days. Pasargad Bank, which had earlier deployed Dotin’s portable emergency data center system, Samsonite, was able to restore limited functionality by June 19. Sepah Bank, which had not adopted the system, remained offline longer, only regaining basic card functionality by June 20.
Amouzegar said a full system rebuild using partial offline backups continued until June 27. During that period, Samsonite handled over 60 million transactions to stabilize public services.
The pro-Israel hacker group Predatory Sparrow claimed responsibility, stating it had drained more than $90 million from Iran’s largest crypto exchange, Nobitex, while paralyzing Sepah Bank. Sepah handles payments for Iranian military personnel.
“This cyber war ended three days after the ceasefire,” Amouzegar wrote. “But recovery will take months.”
