Sensitive data on the Darknet: G7 is supposed to deal with hacker attacks

Rome. Italy's Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani wants to raise the issue of the recent hacker attacks by a suspected pro-Russian group at the G7 foreign ministers' meeting in Paris on Monday. "We are in a hybrid war. That's why I asked the G7 countries to put this issue at the center of their debate," the Italian news agency Ansa quoted him as saying. The G7 (Group of Seven) includes the industrial nations Germany, France, Italy, Japan, Canada, Great Britain and the USA. The EU is represented at all meetings as a permanent participant.

Tajani had previously made it public that hackers had published sensitive personal data about himself and his family on the dark web. "This exposes me to new threats and attempts at intimidation. They also involve my family and are ready to pay for more details about me and my relatives," Tajani wrote on the X platform. "My reaction is very simple: I will not allow myself to be intimidated in any way," he emphasized.

Tajani suspects that the reason for the attacks was Italy's support for Ukraine, which was attacked by Russia. “Defending the freedom of a sovereign state and clearly supporting the democracy and independence of a nation is dangerous for these criminal actors,” he wrote.

The Italian daily "Il Fatto Cotidiano" reported that a hacker group called "NoName057(16)", which is suspected of having connections to the Russian military intelligence service GRU, has been offering money since October 26th in exchange for passwords, home addresses, CVs, private telephone numbers and other personal data of a total of 18 people whom the group describes as enemies of Russia. In addition to Tajani, those affected include the Italian public prosecutor Francesco Lo Voi, the head of the postal police, Ivano Gabrielli, and the mayor of Aviano, Paolo Tassan-Zanin.

According to information from the Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA) from 2025, “NoName057(16)” is a pro-Russian hacker group that has been publicly known and recruited supporters since the beginning of the Russian full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. They were therefore offered to download software with which they then took part in so-called DDoS attacks using their own resources. These are overload attacks on websites with the aim of making them inaccessible for a while.

In July 2025, an internationally coordinated police and judicial operation led by the BKA and the Frankfurt Attorney General's Office dismantled the IT infrastructure and the global botnet of “NoName057(16)”. The group remained active afterwards.

According to Ansa, Germans and an Austrian were also targeted by the hacker group. The report names a Frankfurt public prosecutor, BKA President Holger Münch, a German journalist and the Austrian President of the EU judicial authority Eurojust, Michael Schmid. The information could not initially be confirmed.

Meloni supported Tajani: “I express my full solidarity with Deputy Prime Minister Antonio Tajani in the face of the revelations about the activities of pro-Russian hackers and the distribution of his personal data on the dark web.” Such machinations are extremely worrying and must be combated with all determination.