Expo 2015

Expo 2015 Milan was a Universal Exposition held in the city of Milan from 1 May to 31 October 2015 under the theme “Feeding the Planet, Energy for Life”. The exposition was organised by the Italian government under the auspices of the Bureau International des Expositions and aimed to showcase innovations in food security, sustainability and nutrition. Over 140 countries participated by constructing national pavilions that displayed technologies, cultural exhibits and culinary traditions. The event attracted more than twenty million visitors who visited the exhibition grounds located in the northwestern area of Milan known as Rho. The exposition was designed to serve as a global platform for dialogue on how to feed a growing population while preserving natural resources.

The exposition site covered an area of approximately 1.1 million square metres and included more than one hundred and thirty pavilions, thematic clusters and service infrastructures. Among the distinctive attractions were the iconic Tree of Life sculpture, the Palazzo Italia pavilion and the Future Food District which presented cutting‑edge agri‑food technologies. The event was positioned as a flagship initiative of Italy’s cultural diplomacy and was intended to leave a lasting legacy of urban regeneration for the host area. In addition to its cultural and scientific programme, the exposition managed a large ticketing operation that handled millions of admissions during its six‑month run.

In early May 2015, shortly before the exposition opened to the public, the official website of Expo 2015 was disrupted by a cyberattack claimed by the hacktivist group Anonymous Italy, which targeted the ticketing section and caused a temporary interruption of online services. The attackers claimed responsibility in a public statement released just before the inauguration, noting their motivation to protest the event’s perceived corporate influences. Technical teams restored the website within a few hours, restoring access to the ticketing platform after the brief outage. This incident occurred alongside an earlier, unrelated server issue that had already affected ticket sales, illustrating the concurrent challenges faced by the organisers during the launch period.