Germany accuses Russia of cyberattack on air security and election interference, Russian embassy in Berlin denies
Germany awarded Russia on Friday a “computer attack” targeting its air traffic control system as well as a ” campaign “ of destabilization during the last German legislative elections, and summoned the Russian ambassador to Berlin to answer these accusations.
“The Russian military intelligence service GRU is responsible for this attack” computer committed in August 2024 against German air security, which Berlin “clearly attributes (…) to the hacker collective APT 28, also known as Fancy Bear”declared a spokesperson for the German Foreign Ministry during a regular press briefing.
“Secondly, today we can formally state that Russia attempted, through the Storm 1516 campaign, to influence and destabilize the last Bundestag election [Parlement allemand, en février] that, on an ongoing basis, the internal affairs of the Federal Republic of Germany”he continued.
What the Russian embassy in Berlin denied. “The Russian ambassador categorically rejected accusations of involvement of Russian state structures in these incidents and, in general, in the activities of hacker groups”said the Russian diplomatic representation in a press release sent to Agence France-Presse.
Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, European countries have accused Russia of waging a war “hybrid” against them – a mix of unconventional means that can include sabotage and disinformation campaigns. Berlin holds “absolutely solid evidence” of Moscow’s involvement in these two affairs, but will not detail them, to protect the work of its intelligence services, said the spokesperson. The latter also announced, “in close consultation with our European partners, a series of retaliatory measures in order to make Russia pay the price for its hybrid attacks”.
