Cyber Incident Victim: Funke Mediengruppe
Date:
Feb 2022
Location:
Germany
Summary
The Funke Mediengruppe experienced cyberattacks involving bot-driven assaults on its websites and heightened bot activity across its social media platforms, disrupting content updates and comment sections during coverage of the Ukraine conflict. The attacks, characterized by automated software waves targeting news portals and magazines, also affected affiliated media brands like the Frankfurter Rundschau and other Ippen Media Network outlets, where pro-Putin trolls flooded social media channels. Similar incidents had previously disrupted the group’s operations, causing prolonged technical issues and temporary newspaper production limitations. Defensive measures were implemented to mitigate further attacks.
| CIA Posture | Motives | Tactics, Techniques & Procedures |
|---|---|---|
| Available to members | 1 motive | 2 techniques |
| Threat Actors | Type | Location |
|---|---|---|
| 0 actors | Available to members | Available to members |
Description
The Funke Mediengruppe experienced cyberattacks targeting its digital infrastructure on February 25, 2022, coinciding with its coverage of Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Automated bot networks launched multi-wave assaults against the media group's websites throughout the day, affecting news portals, magazines, and regional newspapers including the Westdeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung (WAZ). These coordinated bot attacks aimed to disrupt service, with the WAZ Live-Blog explicitly warning readers about potential delays in content updates due to the ongoing incidents. Simultaneously, the group observed heightened malicious bot activity across its social media brand accounts, though specific platforms weren't named. Company statements confirmed immediate defensive measures were implemented to mitigate further attacks, though technical details of these countermeasures weren't disclosed.
The incident extended beyond Funke Mediengruppe, impacting other German media organizations covering the Ukraine conflict. Ippen Media Network's Frankfurter Rundschau (FR) reported comparable disruptions, particularly in social media comment sections that became inundated with pro-Putin trolls and bots. FR's editor-in-chief Thomas Kaspar documented escalating coordinated comment activity since Russian troop deployments along Ukraine's border, noting consistent attack patterns across multiple Ippen Media brands. This marked at least the second major cyber incident for Funke Mediengruppe, following a December 2020 attack that forced temporary emergency newspaper editions and caused weeks-long operational disruptions. The 2022 attacks specifically impaired real-time digital news delivery during a critical geopolitical event but didn't reportedly cause physical production halts like the prior incident.