Hassan Rouhani
Hassan RouhaniReuters

Iran denied claims that the US carried out a successful cyber-attack against Iranian targets last week, following the downing of an American drone aircraft over the Straits of Hormuz.

Mohammad Javad Azari Jahromi, Iran’s information and communications minister, said the US had attempted a cyber-attack – but failed, after the national Iranian firewall blocked the attack.

“They try hard, but have not carried out a successful attack,” Jahromi tweeted Monday.

Jahromi claimed that Iran had blocked some 33 million attempted cyber attacks in 2018.

“Media asked if the claimed cyber attacks against Iran are true,” he said. “Last year we neutralized 33 million attacks with the (national) firewall.”

Over the weekend, The Washington Post reported that the US had carried out a successful cyber-attack on Iranian missile systems, after Iran downed an American unmanned aircraft.

According to the Post, the targets were computers and systems responsible for missile attacks. The attacks were planned for weeks, if not months, but proposed only after the attack on two oil tankers earlier this month.

On Thursday, The New York Times reported that US President Donald Trump approved military strikes against Iran in retaliation for downing an American surveillance drone, but pulled back from launching them.

"We were cocked and loaded to retaliate last night on 3 different sights when I asked, 'how many will die?' '150 people, sir,' was the answer from a general. 10 minutes before the strike I stopped it, [it was] not proportionate to shooting down an unmanned drone," Trump tweeted Friday.