Entrepreneurship

Bitkom: Drone Attacks, Sabotage, and Cyberattacks — Business Community Warns of Hybrid Attacks

August 6, 2026. A planned drone attack at Leipzig Airport failed yesterday, but the German business community fears successful attacks of this kind and the resulting consequences. 87 percent of companies believe it is likely that Germany will face a serious crisis as a result of hybrid attacks. In hybrid conflicts, state actors—who often remain hidden—attack the economy, government, infrastructure, or other facilities using traditional analog methods or cyberattacks. These attacks can take the form of arson or bombings, for example, but in recent years they have increasingly been carried out via cyberattacks or, indeed, using drones.

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18 percent of companies consider a serious crisis resulting from such attacks to be extremely likely, while just over two-thirds (69 percent) consider it somewhat likely. Only 5 percent of companies consider such a scenario somewhat unlikely, and 3 percent consider it extremely unlikely. These are the findings of a recent representative survey of 1,003 companies in Germany with 10 or more employees.

“When discussing hybrid attacks in a gray zone between war and peace, this is no longer a matter of theoretical risk. Germany is attacked digitally thousands of times every day, and the trail increasingly leads to Russia and China—and to state intelligence agencies. But physical attacks on critical infrastructure, government agencies, and companies are also a reality,” says Bitkom President Dr. Ralf Wintergerst. “We must massively increase the resilience of the economy, the government, and society—and we must do so as quickly as possible. Tech companies and startups can make an important contribution with innovative and powerful technologies to defend against hybrid threats.”

Three-quarters (75 percent) of companies believe that political tensions between Russia and NATO or the U.S. and Iran increase the risk of analog and digital attacks on Germany. Only one-third (33 percent) believe Germany is currently well prepared for cyberattacks.

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