Increasingly vulnerable IT systems. False alarms on airline flights, sabotage of the cold chain, up to the publication of sensitive data of politicians and investigators by computer hackers on the dark web. The hybrid war involving cyber attacks, behind which pro-Russian activists are probably hiding, aims to sow chaos in the countries that have expressed their support for Ukraine. A threat to democracies that sees Italy among the countries affected. Defense Minister Guido Crosetto defined it as a new "epochal challenge".
In Italy, cyber skills are fragmented among the various administrations
The national security apparatus is moving at the highest levels to deal with the wave of cyber attacks that has also been hitting Italy for weeks. On Tuesday 10 November the Minister of the Interior, Matteo Piantedosi, convened the National Committee for order and security with a focus on hacker attacks which affected infrastructure but not only.
But how is Italy structured to intercept and repel threats? Cyber skills still suffer from fragmentation between the various administrations. In 2021, an attempt was made to create a coordination structure with the National Cybersecurity Agency which is entrusted with the task of protecting security and resilience in the cyber space, to prevent and mitigate the greatest number of cyber attacks. There is therefore the Postal Police which protects critical IT infrastructures of national importance and combats crimes perpetrated with the use of IT systems. Intelligence agencies have their own cyber nuclei, as do the Ministry of Defense and other ministries.
The Farnesina case
With the reform of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation strongly supported by Minister Tajani and which came into force on 1 January 2026, a General Directorate dedicated to cyber issues, IT and technological innovation was created and a Cyber operations room active 24 hours a day. When the cyber room registers an attack, it is explained, it activates an immediate connection with the National Cybersecurity Agency (ACN), the CSIRT Italy and the National Center anti-cyber crime for the protection of critical infrastructures (CNAIPIC) of the postal police, to implement a coordinated response of the entire national IT system to the attack. Immediately after the discovery of the incident, ministry sources report, coordination was activated with the EU cyber security structures.
The Cyber Room's activity develops along three main lines: prevention of threats and risks; monitoring; response to attacks. Since the start of activities in January 2026, it has intercepted and blocked over 630 thousand events and attempts of a malicious nature directed towards the digital perimeter of the administration; neutralized approximately 3.5 million malicious emails, out of a total of almost 23 million emails received from external domains; carried out thousands of analysis activities, of which 817 in the last quarter. Among the main attacks rejected, Farnesina sources report, "there are those on the occasion of the visits of Ukrainian President Zelensky to Italy, in particular in May 2023 and then January 2025, and during the Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics, in February 2026, when in addition to services connected to the Olympic event, sites of Italian diplomatic offices were also targeted". Lastly, a "particularly strong cyber attack on the Ministry's website was recorded in October this year". In the attack, "repelled without damage to the structures, some embassy and consulate sites around the world were also targeted". However, “DDoS - Distributed Denial of Service” attacks occur on a daily basis.
