Washington: Ramping up its fight against Islamic State, the United states military is now conducting cyber attacks on the terror outfit.
The attacks include efforts to prevent the group from distributing propaganda, videos, or other types of recruiting and messaging on social media sites such as Twitter, and across the Internet in general.
US military's six year old Cyber Command would use cyber technique to target the group's abilities to use social media and the Internet to recruit fighters and inspire followers.
A US-led coalition has been striking ISIS fighters in Iraq and Syria since August 2014
“We are dropping cyber bombs,” U.S. Deputy Secretary of Defense Robert O. Work told the NY Times. “We have never done that before.”
"We have now begun to use our exquisite cyber capabilities in this fight against Daesh," Baghdad-based Major General Peter Gersten told Pentagon reporters, using an acronym that comes from the group's name in Arabic.
He did not elaborate except to say the effort is "highly coordinated" and has been "very effective."
The US Cyber Command is charged with protecting America's military and some civilian networks from attacks, as well as deploying its own offensive cyber strategies if needed.
By 2018, it will have more than 6,000 military and civilian technical experts working across 133 teams.
In February Defense Secretary Ashton Carter has said that Cyber Command is beginning to conduct operations against ISIS.
Late last year Carter met with commanders, telling them they had 30 days to bring him options for how the military could use its cyberwarfare capabilities against the group's deadly insurgency across Iraq and Syria, and spreading to Libya and Afghanistan.
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