According to its own information, the German Energy Agency reported a cyber attack on the weekend of November 11th to 12th. The servers are currently all shut down and accessibility is only limited. At least the homepage still functions as a source of information.
Almost nothing is going on at dena at the moment. After the cyber attack at the weekend, the entire IT infrastructure was shut down or damaged. There is no exact information available yet. It is not yet clear who attacked Dena. As a result of the attack, dena has since been technically unable to work and cannot be reached by telephone or email. dena immediately took all IT security measures, including with the help of external IT forensics experts. The state authorities are informed. The aim of all measures is now to restore the ability to work as quickly as possible under safe conditions.
Government agencies in sight?
dena is a project company and a public company owned by the federal government. The shareholder is the Federal Republic of Germany. However, dena has a more advisory role and prepares studies for many areas of energy transition and climate protection. Why the agency should be a worthwhile target is unclear. It should also be clear to the attackers that a government institution will not pay a ransom if a ransomware attack has occurred. So you have to assume that it was a targeted disruption from which the attacker is hoping to gain something.
Because dena describes itself in short form: “The German Energy Agency – dena for short is a competence center for applied energy transition and climate protection. dena looks at the challenges of a climate-neutral society and supports the federal government in achieving its energy and climate policy goals. Since its founding in 2000, the agency has been developing solutions, putting them into practice and bringing together partners from politics, business, science and all parts of society - nationally and internationally. dena is a project company and a public company owned by the federal government. The shareholder is the Federal Republic of Germany.”
More at dena.de