The British government on Thursday said it was determined to frustrate what it called escalating Iranian threats to people on UK soil, citing cyberattacks and the use of criminal proxies to carry out attacks.
"The Government has long recognised there is a persistent and growing physical threat to people posed by Iran to the UK. Direct action against UK targets has substantially increased over recent years," the government wrote.
The report came in the form of point-by-point responses to a July 10 Parliamentary Intelligence and Security Committee on Iran which said Iran poses one of the gravest state-based threats to British national security, on par those from Russia and China.
"We have taken significant steps to ensure the safety of UK citizens and ensure our
world-leading law enforcement and intelligence agencies have the tools they need to
disrupt and degrade the threats that we face from Iran," the government added.
'Degrading interference'
The UK government cited its designation of the Iranian state in its entirety on the enhanced tier of its new Foreign Influence Registration Scheme (FIRS). The move means that anyone working for or directed by the Iranian state to conduct activities in the UK must declare those activities or face up to five years in prison.
“This includes members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). FIRS is a critical disruptive tool for the UK,” the report said.
“We are conducting extensive work to understand and degrade Iranian interference and malign influence activity in the UK, looking at potential vectors of concern, including cultural centers and educational facilities that may have links to the Iranian government or support its political objectives,” the report added.
The original parliamentary report concluded Iran is increasingly willing to carry out assassinations, espionage and cyber attacks within the United Kingdom
Tehran's embassy in London at the time rejected the allegations as "baseless, politically motivated and hostile claims."
Use of criminal gangs
The government confirmed parliament's findings that Iranian intelligence has developed close ties with criminal gangs "to expand the capability of its networks and obscure their involvement in malign activity."
“We continue to work with our allies to better understand, expose, and condemn Iranian actions—and to bring Iranian-linked criminals to justice wherever in the world they may be,” it added.
The government added that cyber espionage is “almost certainly a core and enduring objective” of Iranian state-linked cyber activity.
“Iranian-linked cyber actors also have access to several powerful disruptive and destructive tools at their disposal,” the government response said.
Asked by parliament to consider the feasibility of proscribing Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as a terrorist organization, the government declined to specify if the move was under consideration.
"The Government recognises the serious threat posed by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps," adding that it was dedicated to implementing recommendations "to create a new State Threats Proscription-like Tool."
Legislation to advance that mechanism would be it advanced when parliamentary time allows, it added, without elaborating.
