Turkey secretly helped Pakistan in creating “Cyber Army” against India
Over the past years, the relations between India–Turkey had turned sour because “Pakistan” always cast a shadow on their relations. Turkey’s capital Ankara blocked India’s membership to Nuclear Supplier’s Group (NSG) due to Pakistani pressure, as a result which strained their relations.
In a recent revelation, it came to light that Turkey secretly helped Pakistan in creating a cyber army against India. In an interview with Turkey’s local TV station in Kahramanmaraş, Suleyman Soylu, Turkey’s Interior Minister revealed in 2018 in Islamabad that Turkey had helped Pakistan in setting up a cyber unit to run influence operations against India in South East Asia.
According to the Nordic Monitor report, under a bilateral agreement, a deal was carried out to attack the US and India to influence the views of Muslims in South East Asia. The plan received approval from Imran khan, the then prime minister of Pakistan who also held the position of interior minister simultaneously during a meeting with Turkish Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu in 2018.
Soylu has gained popularity by running troll and bot armies in cyberspace on behalf of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and had worked on similar covert operations even before he became interior minister in September 2016.
In a few years, Turkey emerged as a key cyber power nation by offering cyber assistance to Middle Eastern and Asian countries as the country established its national cyber ‘army’ that will tackle national cyber threats against the country.
Turkey has also become a designated cyber ally for Qatar by signing various bilateral agreements for providing cyber support to Qatar. Turkey has proven its ability and trust to Qatar during resolution of QNA hack and also provide cyber help to them on FIFA world Cup 2022.
In March, Turkey participated in UAE cyber security trade Fair GISEC 2022 Gulf Information security Expo conference through its Cyber security firm Interprobe. The Turkish firm also serves its services in the other provinces of Asian region i.e., Azerbaijan, Qatar and Kazakhstan.
