Law enforcement agencies across California were recently warned that the Iran war could lead to a surprise drone attack in the Golden State, but sources told The Times on Wednesday there’s no credible intelligence to support it.
In a memo sent to agencies that are part of a federal Joint Terrorism Task Force, the government said, “We recently acquired information that as of early February 2026, Iran allegedly aspired to conduct a surprise attack using unmanned aerial vehicles from an unidentified vessel off the coast of the United States Homeland, specifically against unspecified targets in California, in the event that the US conducted strikes against Iran.”
A source with knowledge of the memo who was not authorized to discuss it publicly said the warning was issued based on intelligence received by the U.S. Coast Guard. Law enforcement sources experienced in intelligence said such alerts are cautionary in nature.
The source is experienced in counterterrorism and said “that it’s not been deemed credible at this time.”
The sources stressed that the warning was cautionary and there was no indication Iran was planning an attack or that it could successfully launch one.
But the warning played into security strategies that local and national authorities enacted after the war began.
One official told The Times the memo was one of several daily updates received and distributed by law enforcement and emergency response agencies.
The Department of Homeland Security declined to comment on the memo and referred questions to the FBI.
Officials with the FBI declined to comment when reached by The Times on Wednesday. The memo was first reported by ABC News.
Gov. Gavin Newsom said he and his office were aware of the reports about the possibility of drone strikes and have passed that information along to local partners.
“Drone issues have been top of mind and we’ve assembled some work groups specifically around those concerns,” Newsom said.
The governor added that he has not spoken to President Trump about the potential threat.
Since the U.S. and Israel began launching strikes on Iran on Feb. 28, the California Governor’s Office of Emergency Services Homeland Security Division has elevated its security posture.
“While we can’t discuss sensitive details, Californians should know that this kind of coordination happens every day to keep people safe,” a spokesperson for the Governor’s Office of Emergency Services said in a statement. “California is prepared to protect its communities, and we’ll continue working closely with our federal partners.”
State officials would not comment on the memo but said that state, local and federal agencies were continually sharing information about threats and security efforts.
Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department officials would not comment on the memo, but in a statement said the department was continuing to operate at an “elevated level of readiness and is maintaining increased vigilance.”
Though it’s unclear how Iran would attack California with a drone, incursions inside U.S. borders by unmanned aircraft have occurred and been defended against in the past, although none so far have presented a physical threat to the U.S.
In February 2023, the U.S. shot down a Chinese spy balloon, which at the time escalated tensions between the two countries. China maintained that the vessel was being used for meteorological research and accidentally drifted toward the U.S.
U.S. military officials have also said they have experienced thousands of incursions by unmanned aircraft along the U.S.-Mexico border. In 2024, Air Force Gen. Gregory M. Guillot told a Senate Armed Services Committee the number of incursions was alarming, and much of the activity was likely linked to drug and human traffickers using drones for their operations.
Drone operations and defenses have been an expanding realm in military confrontations across the globe, with the Defense Department referring to drones as the most recent “weapon of choice on the battlefield.”
In Arizona, the U.S. Army recently tested a new 30-millimeter explosive round that would be fired from Apache helicopters, designed to explode in front of and take out drones.
In February, U.S. lawmakers blasted the Department of Defense after reports that it had shot down a Customs and Border Protection drone using a “high risk counter-unmanned aircraft system.”
This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.