Russia, China stepped up cyberattacks targeting German businesses, spy agency says

Russia and China have intensified their cyber operations targeting German businesses, according to Sinan Selen, deputy head of Germany’s domestic intelligence agency (BfV).

"Foreign intelligence services are increasingly targeting the German economy," Selen stated at a news conference in Berlin on Thursday, during the release of a new report by the digital advocacy group Bitkom. "We must all recognize that we are currently under active attack," he emphasized.

Selen noted that the findings of Bitkom's survey were in line with the domestic intelligence agency BfV's assessments, demonstrating growing threats posed by Russia and China.

"German companies attribute 28% of the cyberattacks to foreign intelligence services. This represents an increase of 8% compared to the previous year. Among the affected companies, 46% traced cyberattacks back to Russia and China. This is a deeply concerning figure,” he said.

According to Bitkom's report, data theft, industrial espionage, and sabotage have cost German businesses an estimated €289B (approximately $342B), representing an 8% increase compared to the previous year.

Selen named Iran and North Korea as two other major perpetrators of cyberattacks against Germany, while noting that in recent years, foreign intelligence agencies have expanded their targets beyond businesses.

“In addition to the increasing threat to the economy from cyberattacks, we are also observing that politics, administration, academia, and civil society continue to be targeted by attacks,” he said, adding that foreign state actors were not only doing this for information gathering but also to exert influence, spread disinformation, or in some cases even to prepare or execute sabotage operations.

“They are becoming increasingly professional, aggressive, and agile. We see them infiltrating networks, often covertly and very carefully, in order to stay undetected for as long as possible,” Selen said. “We see a comprehensive and holistic target area for cyberattacks, ranging from disruptive actions and disinformation to classic espionage in the political, economic, and research sectors, and even attacks on infrastructure and companies,” he added.